


Lawful Good and Chaotic Neutral

by NorroenDyrd



Series: Oak and Ivy [4]
Category: Elder Scrolls, Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Genre: Action/Adventure, Bards College, Character building, Complicated Relationships, Dungeon, Dungeon Crawl, Dwemer Ruins, Exploration, Finding courage, Grimsever, Male-Female Friendship, Moral Lessons, Morally Ambiguous Character, Morthal, Multi, Platonic Romance, Riften, Shyness, Team Bonding, Thieves Guild, True Love, Trust, Trust Issues, fighting scenes, unlikely friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-26
Updated: 2016-01-11
Packaged: 2018-05-09 14:06:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 32,828
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5542712
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NorroenDyrd/pseuds/NorroenDyrd
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Desperately pining for Mjoll the Lioness and struggling to prove his worth to her, the meek and quiet Aerin dares to leave the comfort of his Riften home and embarks on a dangerous journey to retrieve Mjoll's lost sword, Grimsever. On his quest, he is joined by a snarky Dunmer rogue, who seems to have a troubled love story of her own.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

He was wakened by loud clattering of pots and pans, some time before the first cockcrow. This was nothing unusual - part of his daily routine, really; Mjoll must gotten up early and started making herself a hasty breakfast. But even though he knew what it was all about, this did not stop him from crawling out of bed, pulling on a dressing gown and, barefoot and bleary-eyed, trudging off to peek into her room. The filthy tongues around town were wrong; he and the adventurer he had rescued and allowed to stay with him in Riften for as long as she liked - they slept separately. Although there were times when he found himself wishing... But no; he didn't dare even think about it.  
  
He blushed fiercely as he poked his head into Mjloll's bedroom, as if entering it was sacrilege. It was empty; just as he had thought. His gaze lingered on the blankets, which had been pulled neatly over the smoothened pillow; and as it did, he imagined what Mjoll looked like while sleeping... He had never seen her asleep, not since that time, so long ago, when he was treating her wounds. She had looked so vulnerable then, so weak... For once, he had been the one who was bold and steadfast and protective. He cherished that memory, and even though his conscience screamed that it was wrong, part of him longed for the story of their meeting to repeat itself - for Mjoll to lean on him like on a rock, to place her life into his hands... With a sigh, he closed the door and went off to locate the source of the clattering.  
  
She did not notice him appear in the doorway, and for a while, he watched her in silence, rubbing his left eye absent-mindedly with his fist like a small child. She was humming softly to herself as she moved about, stirring a pot here, stuffing a tidbit into mouth there, fiddling with straps of her armour on the go. He admired her bold, fluid movements, and every time she flipped her hair back, his heart fluttered like an aspen leaf in the wind. Gods, she was so beautiful - with that solid, earthly beauty, like that of the Nord land itself. He was lucky to have come to know her; her sudden arrival into his unremarkable, dreary life was a true blessing from the gods. If only he had a way of telling her...  
  
Finally, she caught sight of him - and smiled. He wondered to himself if this smile was any different than the ones she gave the Riften townsfolk... he could never tell; but he wanted, desperately, childishly, with all his heart, for there to be some sort of very, very special smile, reserved for him and for him alone.  
  
'Good morning, Aerin,' she said softly, stretching out her hand to greet him. Her touch was warm and reassuring... and made his eyes well up with happy tears - which, luckily, she never saw; he could not have lived with the thought that he had made a fool out of himself in front of her. 'You know you should not have gotten up because of me; come, go back to bed. I'll return in time to cook you some lunch'.  
  
Aerin clenched his fists in frustration. He detested it when she talked to him like this - as though he was a child. Well, he was not! He had saved her life once, and he would gladly do it again, if only she let him!  
  
'Where are you going so early?' he asked, struggling to sound casual.  
  
'The Thieves Guild is supposed to be out and about in the back alleys,' she replied. 'I'll see if I can catch hold of a few of those scumbags and give them a piece of my mind'.  
  
'Can... Can I come with you?'   
  
He did not dare hope for a positive answer; he never got it. While Mjoll was out there fighting crime, he got to stay at home and stare out of the window at the golden rain streaming down from the birch trees and to daydream about being a mighty warrior worthy of fighting side by side with the woman he... respected and admired. This time was no different.  
  
'I am sorry, Aerin; this is too dangerous. But you can go to the market with me in the afternoon if you want to'.  
  
Sure. Go to the market. Trot, colt-like, in Mjoll's wake. Feel the mocking stares of the passersby. Hear their venomous whispers. _Here comes Mjoll the Lioness and her little sidekick. Poor woman, it must be tough living with two shadows. Tough? No; annoying, more like it. Doesn't he ever leave her alone?_ Be reminded that he was nothing but a thorn in Mjoll's side, a speck on the great hero's shining armour... And suffer through this humiliation for the sake of being with her, looking at her, listening to her voice flow like a mountain creek over pebbles...  
  
'Yes, Mjoll,' he said meekly, and went back to bed.  
  
  
He spent a few uneasy hours waiting for the dawn to start flooding in like Riften's famous honey. Then, he got up again, and dressed, and told himself that he urgently needed a stroll to clear his head. He never could get used to waiting for Mjoll when she went on her daily crusades against the Thieves Guild; it was as if he had a sore spot within him that kept on aching no matter how hard he tried to soothe it.  
  
As he exited the house, he almost bumped into Marcurio, that self-assured wizard for hire from the Bee and Barb that made him feel like such a pathetic little worm every time they crossed paths... and some other man, tall and broad-shouldered, with a bushy dirty-blonde beard peeking from under a massive horned helmet... Must have been Marcurio's latest employer. Aerin pressed himself against the wall to allow them to pass by without noticing him, but they did not seem to be in too much of a hurry; that was when he overheard them talking.  
  
'And here we are,' Marcurio declared in that pompous manner of his. 'Back in Riften'.  
  
'This seems like a decent place, if you don't count all the riffraff from the Ratway,' the horned helmet growled, sounding a little bear-like. 'An adventurer like me could settle down here. Maybe even find a wife. Any thoughts on that, you wise guy?'  
  
'What, wives?' the wizard asked; judging by his voice, he was smirking. 'There's always Haelga, of course... But if you are the boring old family man type, Mjoll the Lioness is a true gemstone. Strong, honest, heart in the right place, and all that other nonsense... Only...'  
  
'Only what?' the helmet inquired, apparently becoming interested. Aerin felt his heart drop down to his heels and then soar up to its rightful place in his chest again.  
  
'There is that little leech, Aerin,' Marcurio remarked idly. 'Don't know what their relationship is, exactly; some say they sleep together, but I doubt it; there's too little of a man in him. Either way, he follows her around like the critter in that Khajiit nursery song - you know, J'Mari had a little lamb... My bet is, if you court her and marry her, Aerin will be on the dowry. Sort of like part of the furniture'.  
  
The helmet grunted and then broke into a loud, snorting laugh; Marcurio followed suit and, still laughing, they went off towards the inn. Aerin remained rooted to one spot, breathless, quivering all over. Sidekick, shadow, annoyance he could take, but this... This was too much. A leech, was he? Mjoll's dowry? Part of the furniture? Was that the popular opinion now? Did they no longer consider him a person? Did Mjoll..? He bit into his lips. This had gone on long enough; it was time he did something... anything to prove to everyone that there was more than enough man in him, that he was more than just a growth on Mjoll's back, that he was her equal, her friend, perhaps even more than that... To rub it into their jeering faces. And to make Mjoll see how much she meant to him.  
  
Aerin smiled a slow, wakening smile, as somewhere in the depths of his mind, there formed a plan - a real, solid, legitimate plan, which made him boyishly proud of himself. Grimsever. The priceless blade Mjoll lost in that ruin that almost took her life. If he found it, if he brought it back... That would, once and for all, turn Aerin the tag-along, Aerin the nuisance, Aerin the interloper into a hero... A hero of Mjoll's calibre.  
  
He took a deep breath of air, trying to suppress the feverish excitement of having come up with a brilliant scheme and to think rationally. If he was going on an expedition to Mscin... Mzin... whatever that Dwarven place was called, he needed equipment. A supply of food and water. Torches. And armour, of course; some kind of weapon, too. Mjoll had cleared most of the ruin, of course, but who knows - it might have acquired new - unfriendly - tenants. His gait firm and resolute, his head bowed down slightly like that of a charging bull, Aerin marched back inside the house to fetch his coinpurse. Much as he hated it, a visit to the market was called for.  
  
  
'Whatcha staring at, you wimp?' Grelka barked, her smouldering hostile glare making Aerin's feet and hands go numb. 'You gonna buy something, or you just here to gawk?'  
  
'I... I...'   
  
He had wanted to tell her that he was just browsing, that he had his eye on the lovely set of leather armour over there - and also, that he had come in peace, so there was really no need for her to treat him like a mortal enemy... But the only sound that came out of his parched, ache-gripped throat was a faint, piteous cough. He had never liked crowded place, especially when the crowd was made out of people that despised him...  
  
'Hit the road,' Grelka said gruffly. 'You're blocking the way for proper customers. If you're running an errand for Mjoll, tell her to come here herself. I deal with people, not wastes of space'.  
  
Aerin raised his hand to his throat and backed away from the fierce shop-keeper. So much for buying equipment. He shouldn't have tried Grelka's stall first; now he felt discouraged from visiting other merchants. He knew they would not be half as outspoken, but they would most definitely be condescending. Barely holding back derisive sneers, hiding their contempt and irritation beneath masks of genial politeness... Perhaps he should just go home and wait for Mjoll in front of the open window.  
  
'Hey there...'   
  
He started violently, doing a very convincing impression of a startled deer, as a small, gloved hand patted him on the shoulder, and a Dark Elf woman's deep, drawling voice crawled, serpent-like, into his ear.  
  
'Don't mind that stick in the mud. I have got what you need. High-quality glass, mere hundred gold for the entire set.'  
  
He attempted to shake her off, to dig his heels into the ground - but she dragged him away with her into a murky side alley, where she forced him to sit down on some lopsided crate and unfolded her merchandise before him. He fingered the smooth, gleaming surface of the cuirass she was brandishing in front of him - more out of politeness, for most of his attention was drawn to the shady merchant herself.  
  
She was short and lithe, with red hair cut like a small boy's and large, almond-shaped, half-lidded eyes that made him uneasy; the look they had in them, shrewd and sly and slightly wanton, sent a flaming blush from his collar bones to the tip of his chin.  
  
'Well? What do you think?' she asked silkily, parting her lips in a smile that resembled the leer of some sort of feral predator.  
  
'It... It's stolen, isn't it?' he asked falteringly, frantically trying to avoid the penetrating ruby gaze.  
  
She clicked her tongue in mock disapproval.  
  
'Stolen is such an ugly word. I prefer to say put to better use. This precious baby was gathering dust in a stingy old Nord's vault; it did no good to him! But you - you will give its fine qualities the application they deserve!'  
  
Aerin shook his head. Resolute. He had to be resolute. He had to prove that, like Mjoll, he had the guts to stand up to the scum from the Ratway.  
  
'Not interested,' he said - with far more tremor in his voice than he had strived for.  
  
'Oh come now, Aerin,' the Dunmer purred into his ear. 'Are you putting off your little expedition?'  
  
His eyes rounded in astonishment.  
  
'How... Where...' he choked, blinking in blank disbelief.  
  
She smiled and cocked her head coquettishly to one side.  
  
'A person in my line of works knows things. I have seen you around, tailing Mjoll the Lioness; I have seen the puppy-eyed look you give her. And now you are venturing into the great wide open all alone, out of the honourable matron's shadow, shopping in the market for armour... You obviously have some sort of escapade planned - perhaps to prove to Mjoll that you are a man and not a mouse?'  
  
He made a loud gulp. The way she had seen through him was uncanny.    
  
She took in his flabbergasted expression with a satisfied nod and went on,  
  
'I can help you with that, Aerin. You are obviously a townie kid, used to a warm bed and a roof over your head; I, on the other hand, know quite a bit about the wilderness. Let's say we alter our deal a little: instead of buying this fine set of glass armour, you buy my sword arm? I will have you know I come from solid mercenary background; my Uncle Teldryn is a sellsword, quite a good one, too, as far as I gather, though I haven't seen the old fetcher for years...'  
  
He jerked his head from side to side, attempting to shake that soft hypnotic voice out of his ears.  
  
'Forget it,' he snapped. 'I don't make deals with thieves'.  
  
And then, just as he was going to get up and brush past the Dunmer and race back to the safety of his home - her expression changed. Her eyes grew sincere and wistful; she drew away from him and said,  
  
'I know how it feels, Aerin. To be in love with someone and realize that you are unworthy. I am familiar with the longing that is so painfully evident in your eyes; more familiar than you might think. I'll admit, I love the jingle of septims as much as the next rogue - but if you hire me, you will not only be getting the services of a mercenary. You will be gaining a friend. Someone who understands'.  
  
For a long while, he stared at her in silence, the echo of her voice still pulsing inside his mind. This had to be a lure, a trick to coax him into parting with his money... But it was working.  
  
'Fine,' he muttered at long last, reaching out for his purse. 'You are hired. We are to get to a Dwarven ruin and to retrieve a lost sword'.  
  
'Right behind you,' she said, smiling.


	2. Chapter 2

'You silly little boy! Stuck again? Let me give you a hand'.  
  
'I'm not stuck,' Aerin grumbled, jerking his boot free of the marshland's sticky clutches. 'And shouldn't you be more... deferential? Given that I am your employer'.  
  
She smiled as, disregarding all his protests, she gripped him tightly by the forearm and pulled him back onto firm ground. The same smile had played on her voluptuous lips (he had read that word in a book and thought that it fit her perfectly... the thought made him blush, of course) when he struggled to remember the ruin's name and she listened patiently to his mumblings while tracing their future route on a half-faded old map with her long fingernail. The same smile had slid across her face when he obediently accepted her proposal to save time and strength by taking a carriage to the town nearest to the ruin and trekking across the wilderness from there. The same smile had flashed at him like unsheathed dagger whenever he tore his dreamy gaze away from the blurred hills that rolled past them and turned to look at his hireling, sitting in the opposite seat, her legs crossed, eyeing him as if he was some sort of amusing curio. The smile unsettled him, made him shrink his head into his shoulders and wish he had stayed at home... And at the same time, it made him want to press on, filling him with silent anger. What right did that Dark Elf have to smirk at him like that, as if she was indulging a child? He was going to show her, he was going to prove...  
  
The stillness that enveloped the drowsy marshes round Morthal - their carriage's destination and the start of their dreary hike to the north-east - the stillness that had so far been broken only by the squelching of springy, dark, snow-powdered tussocks beneath their feet... was now shattered, glass-like, by a high-pitched howl that made Aerin's palms grow clammy with sweat. The Dunmer, who was still holding his arm, released him, stepped back, pressed her finger against her lips and slowly readied her bow. Now no longer paying heed to her shivering, cowering - and, well, whimpering - employer, completely withdrawn into herself, she shifted her arrow into a comfortable position, aiming at the low hillock ahead of them. And sure enough, that was where they appeared, outlined so clearly against the rising moons - like a picture out of a story book, only so terrifyingly real. Wolves. Four or five of them, led by a giant of a beast, almost the size of a sabre cat, with a thick silvery mane and yellow eyes burning with a flame of relentless hunger. The Dunmer took a deep breath and prepared to release the string, the gleaming steel arrowtip pointing straight towards the pack leader's heart. And that was when Aerin screamed and broke into a run.  
  
  
The pack leader let out a short, commanding growl, and the wolves darted downhill, raising sparkling clouds of snowy dust. Aerin zigzagged blindly across the boggy flatland, zooming from one gnarled, snow-capped tree to another like a rabbit, flailing his arms in the air, his frenzied heart thumping with a single thought, _'I don't want to die, I don't want to die!'._  
  
 And as he raced through the darkening marsh, the wolves gliding, shadow-like, in his wake, it steadily grew more and more difficult for him to tear his feet out of the squishy mixture of snow and mud; it clung on to him, slowing him down, and the beasts drew ever closer... He could hear their rasping breath, saliva bubbling in the back of their throats in anticipation of a delicious, succulent meal.  
  
His heart contracting, his vision going black, he commanded his weary, pulsing legs to make one final, desperate effort to carry him away from danger - and, tripping over a greyish-white, snake-like log, fell, face down, right into the middle of a deep, slushy puddle. When, coughing and spluttering, he pushed himself up on his trembling arms, the wolves were dead. Their bodies were lining the puddle's bank - shapeless heaps of fur with a single arrow sticking out of each, like a flagpole on top of a tall mountain slope claimed by some adventurer. And the Dunmer was standing among them, arms crossed, legs wide apart, and that smile, that unbearable smug smile, back on her face.  
  
'Just as I figured,' she said calmly as she watched Aerin scramble ashore, drenched to the bone, his teeth chattering loudly. 'Townie kid at his finest. How did you cope with the wilderness the first time? I heard tell that you found Mjoll wounded someplace here'.  
  
'I... didn't... find her... in the wilderness...' Aerin wheezed. 'She... crawled... all the way... to Morthal...'  
  
  
He could still remember it, as clearly as on the day he saw it. A broad, steaming trail of blood in the snow. As though someone had dabbed a brush in dark-red paint and, in one swift movement, drawn a bold line across the pristine white surface. That line entranced him; as he stared at it, as he took in its terrifying meaning, he forgot about anything else in the world. About the grey-roofed town of Morthal that lay behind his back. About the business that had brought him there - old Elgrim's wife had asked him to 'be a dear' and deliver a package to Lami the local alchemist; he had hurried to agree before Elgrim woke up from his afternoon nap and started yelling. About what day it was, and what time. Nothing existed but his petrified, horrorstruck self, and the red line in the snow. It took him a while to tear away from the blood and to look at the wounded woman that lay, panting, at his feet, her fingers twitching in an attempt to keep crawling. But as he finally did, the blank terror that had overcome him at seeing the blood was replaced by heart-wringing pity, and desire to help, and guilt at not having helped sooner. He knelt in the snow at the woman's side, and passed his hand through the air a few inches above her wound, softly chanting the words of the healing incantation he had once learnt from the priests of Mara. When he glanced at the wound itself, at the jagged edges of dented armour digging deep into raw, bloated, crimson flesh, his throat contracted with a nauseous spasm - but he suppressed it, inhaling deeply and chewing his lips till they bled, and forced himself to look at the woman's face... So beautiful, despite the ghastly pallor, despite the glint of the perspiration trickling down her forehead, mixing with remnants of war paint... So beautiful...  
  
  
'Whoa, whoa, whoa!' the Dunmer shook him slightly by the shoulder to bring him back to his senses. 'Now is not the time to have a flashback! You will freeze to death! Before you've paid me my full fee, too!'  
  
'I don't... have any spare clothes...' Aerin mouthed weakly.  
  
'I still have the armour you refused to buy - remarkably spacious, this backpack of mine,' she said, shooting a casual firebolt at a nearby pile of broken-off dry tree branches; Aerin leapt back instinctively, which made her unsettling smile return yet again. 'I know it's glass, but at least it isn't wet'.  
  
Aerin let out a sniff of gratitude and began fumbling about with the fastenings of his soggy coat. His fingers, now red and stinging and numb with cold, refused to obey him; the Dunmer spotted this and grabbed him resolutely by the wrist.  
  
'Let me handle it'.  
  
He squeaked something incoherent, his cheeks flaring.   
  
'Trust me,' she soothed him, a mischievous spark lighting up in her eyes - to Aerin's utmost horror. 'You have no idea how many times I have undressed a man'.  
  
'I don't think I want to have an idea...' he mumbled, screwing up his eyes as her nimble fingers relieved him of the icy burden of his clothes and pulled a set of armour onto him. He let her tug at his limbs and arrange the glass plates on his chest, as if she was a mother dressing a toddler; when she was finally done, he dared to half-open one eye and look at her - very, very suspiciously.  
  
She laughed heartily at his distrustful expression.  
  
'Don't worry, if I had done something nefarious, you would have felt it,' she said genially, patting him on the back. 'Can't say I wasn't tempted to; you are a handsome little devil whether you know it or not. Now, give that armour a test'.  
  
With a deep breath of self-encouragement, Aerin thrust his hands behind his back, lifted his head up high, straightened his hunched shoulders and strolled back and forth in front of their makeshift campfire. Even though glass was supposed to be light armour, it still seemed pretty heavy to him, pressing uncomfortably into his shoulders and making his back and sides ache a little. But with a few more practice strides, he got used to the feeling and told himself he could live with it. Seeing that her employer was ready to continue the journey, the Dunmer put out the fire and motioned to Aerin to follow her up the path further east.  
  
'I am going to charge you for the armour, you know,' she remarked idly as they passed by the hill with the lonesome building where the Vigilants of Stendarr made their home.  
  
Aerin expressed his righteous wrath by going into a sulk, which lasted till they approached the ruin.  
  
  
It was so unlike anything he had ever seen - silvery white towers and towerlets rising solemnly towards the evening sky, where the gentle blue light of the aurora was just beginning to spread. Aerin's eyes widened like a child's; with a faint gasp of awe, he drew himself up to his full height, attempting to at least somehow reduce the feeling of smallness that the great creation of the ancient Dwarves woke within him.  
  
'Don't stand gaping around too long,' the Dunmer gave him a small nudge to draw his attention to something that he had not noticed, too overwhelmed by the enormity of the ruin: connecting each of the towers like threads, there were wooden planks and rope bridges, definitely not part of the original structure. 'Someone has moved in here. And my gut tells me it's the type of someone that doesn't like house guests. Can you sneak?'  
  
'Do I look like I can sneak?' Aerin asked, deeply offended. Seriously, just because this woman was a slippery, slithering thief from the Ratway did not mean everyone else was!  
  
'Yes, I was a fool to ask,' she smirked. 'Your little wolf incident spoke for itself. Well, you'd better be a fast learner'.  
  
  
By sheer luck, the approach to the nearest towerlet was deserted - otherwise, Aerin would have surely been done for. He did his best, he really did - sticking his tongue out with the effort and blinking off frustrated tears, he tried as hard as he could to copy his hireling's natural, fluid movements... But after a few steps in a crouching pose, a dull, persistent ache shot through his legs, and he had to straighten up, huffing and massaging his hips. Having rested for a couple of seconds, he squatted down again, and the pain returned, growing sharper with every step. He was not used to slinking in the shadows!  
  
The Dunmer allowed him to take a break when they reached the safe shelter of the towerlet. While Aerin was stretching his poor, throbbing, sneak-impaired legs, she decided to take a quick look around - 'to get an idea of what, or who, we're up against'.  
  
The towerlet was littered with knick-knacks and whatnots that obviously had not belonged to the Dwemer. There was a rickety, hob-legged stool next to a snow-covered table, a mouldy wooden tray propped against an empty barrel, a small pile of pots and pans - and a wheel of old cheese... at least, that was how Aerin identified the gooey substance, fuzzy with fungus, that he had stepped in.  
  
The Dunmer sifted through this heap of junk, picking up each thingamabob, fingering it, turning it over and casting it aside, each motion of her hands swift and precise; Aerin wondered if this was how she worked while robbing some poor soul blind. Finally, she seemed to have come across something of interest - a crumpled slip of paper, splattered with what could have been mead. Aerin peeked over her shoulder as she scrutinized the paper's contents; it appeared to be some kind of work order - someone had hired a group of people to find Dwarven artifacts within the ruin, and the two parties of the contract seemed to be none too pleased with one another. Quite boring, as far as Aerin was concerned. But the Dunmer seemed to have a different opinion; her eyes flashed when she read the signature, and, slapping herself on the knee, she cried out,  
  
'Azura's bathtub, Maluril Ferano! Never thought I'd meet that old skeeverface again!'  
  
Aerin cringed slightly at his hireling's expressive language, and asked, with a small cough,  
  
'Do you, er, know this... Maluril?'  
  
'Know him? I worked with him! Back in Cyrodiil,' the Dunmer put on a misty-eyed, nostalgic look - much too exaggerated to be entirely sincere, 'We used to run quite a lot of sca... operations, which involved gullible individuals looking to buy ancient relics'.   
  
Aerin's disapproving expression did not discourage her from reminiscing; on the contrary, she perched herself leisurely on the edge of the table and went on, dangling her feet in the air, 'I remember there was this one time when we met an old Breton lady who had a priceless Akaviri vase, part of a set of two, and was searching desperately for its twin. Well, Mal and I, er, retrieved her own vase from her at night, and sold it in the morning as the second vase! It was brilliant! Ah, good times... He taught me a lot of useful stuff, you know - it was a pleasure being partners with him, in all senses'.  
  
Aerin shuddered, recollecting her earlier remark on undressing men. 'Do you... do things with every man you meet?' he asked falteringly.  
  
She run her fingers through her hair, pretending to be deep in thought.  
  
'Hmm, let me think... Not counting the ugly ones, of course... Well, there's you, obviously. I don't have any plans for you,' she could not hold back laughter when Aerin let out a tremendous sigh of relief. 'Then, there was Brand-Shei - you know, one of the Riften merchants, used to have a stall in the market then disappeared?' Aerin nodded; he remembered the whole affair only too well - Mjoll had been so upset about it.   
  
'I...'  the Dunmer paused, looking unexpectedly sheepish, 'I sorta set him up, and felt guilty about it, and helped him break out of jail and go on the run. I was tempted to, well... but it did not seem right. There's also the Thalmor in Markarth - delicious profile, and I managed to get into his good graces, too... but he made it clear that if we got a thing going, he'd have to kill me to cover up the scandal... So I said I'd look him up when I was a thousand years old, and he said fine, and we parted on the friendliest of terms. Then, Jon Battle-Born in Whiterun... He has the sweetest romance with a girl from the rival clan, and I didn't want to ruin it - I am not a...'  
  
'Ooh, someone's coming!' Aerin blurted out; he did not like where this conversation was going, and jumped at the opportunity to change the subject. 'I can hear footsteps'.  
  
The hireling slid off the table, knitting her eyebrows.  
  
'Let me handle the talking; Mal has not been known to mix with the best of crowds'.  
  
But it was already too late; Aerin had made a broad step to meet the leather-clad mound of bulky muscles that was approaching them, and, with a deep, courteous bow, began a small speech of greeting. Not without a slight stammer, of course; the thug towered over him like an oak towers over a modest little shrub - but he told himself he had to overcome his fear, for Mjoll's sake.  
  
'G-good evening, d-dear sir! You... you must be one of the w-workers... excavating this... r-ruin? M-my n-name is... Aerin... Er... My associate here k-knows your employer, M-Maluril F-ferano... I would g-greatly appreciate it if... since we have m-mutual acquaintances... you could... p-perhaps... help us on our...'  
  
The word 'quest' came out as a barely audible choke; the thug had grabbed Aerin by the throat and shook him in the air as if he was a newborn kitten.  
  
'Know Maluril, do you?!' he roared,  his tiny eyes swelling with blood. 'Know that lying, thieving Grey-Skin filth?!'  
  
Aerin attempted to squeeze out a nervous laugh; this enraged the thug even more, making him close his vice-like grip tighter round Aerin's neck - and then, there came a soft swoosh,  and a flash, and a dry crackle,  as the great brute's jugular snapped in two. His eyes now glassy and transparent, his face frozen forever in silent fury, his head rolled down on the ground, leaving a dark trail behind it, similar to the trail Aerin had seen when he found Mjoll. The thug's knees gave way and, tumbling down like a flour sack, he almost squished Aerin beneath his weight.  
  
'Wish... my grandfather... had seen this...' the Dunmer panted, rolling the dead thug off Aerin with one hand, her bloodied blade still clasped in the other. 'It's... not often... that a head comes off... so cleanly... That would... make him... stop nagging me... about not being a proper warrior...'  
  
'You just killed a man,' Aerin said blankly, as he emerged from beneath his heavy, fleshy - and rather smelly - burden, his stunned gaze chained to the severed head.  
  
'So I did,' the Dunmer replied, wiping her sword nonchalantly on the dead thug's belly. 'Saved both our skins in the process, too'.  
  
'B-but... He was a man!' Aerin protested. 'Not a beast of the wilds! He had thoughts, and feelings, and...'  
  
'His thoughts and feelings mostly revolved around gutting us like a pair of fish,' she said sternly. 'We live in a cruel, cruel world, Aerin; a world full of people out to kill one another. If we let our defenses down, we are done for. And those who rely on us are done for too. I'm sure that even your lovely Mjoll has not only been ending the lives of trolls and bears'.  
  
'Don't you dare compare yourself to Mjoll!' Aerin sobbed angrily, clenching his fists and shutting his eyes in an attempt to block out that pale, expressionless stare, that crimson line across the towerlet's floor...  
  
'Fine,' the hireling said; her tone sounded a little wounded, but Aerin did not care. What was that lowlife thinking! As if Mjoll was anything like her! As if Mjoll went about cutting off people's heads and then using their bodies instead of rags to clean her sword!   
  
'Fine. You don't like my methods - you stay out here. Sit and wait for me to return. I'll try and resist the urge to double-cross you and make off to fence Grimsever, Ratway scum that I am'.  
  
Aerin tore his eyes open, his heart thumping. He could not stay and wait! And not because he distrusted his hireling - well, she had actually seen through him there, again... But that was not the main reason. He had to delve into that ruin. To brave the dangers that lay within. To reclaim Grimsever and to return it to Mjoll. He had to...  
  
'Please,' he said shakily, grasping at the Dunmer's hand and gazing into her eyes. 'Please... Let me come with you...'  
  
'Hrmph. All right'.  
  
She pursed her lips, her entire air saying, 'You have to behave to get out of the doghouse'.  
  
'Catch your breath and follow me. We are going in'.


	3. Chapter 3

He was shivering so hard that they had to linger for almost half an hour before entering the ruin. The shock was simply too much to bear. The hireling had graciously wiped all the blood splatters off the front of his armour, but he could still see them; they seeped through the glass surface and burned into his body; they detached themselves from him and floated before his eyes whether he kept them open or shut...  
  
The now-decapitated thug had not been patrolling the outside of the ruins alone; soon after Aerin had made his firm resolution to go in, he and the Dunmer had been joined by a few exceedingly unfriendly armoured individuals, all of which looked disturbingly similar to their fallen comrade (though Aerin had a vague suspicion that a couple of them were female). Pushing her timid employer out of harm's way, the Dunmer had lashed at the bandits as though her whole being was made out of gleaming metal blades, swept into the air by some monstrous gust of wind. She had hacked and slashed and pierced and carved, dashing from one thug to another like a lightning bolt, never letting them as much as cast their shadow on Aerin. But some of the blood that was spurting in all directions still managed to get on Aerin's armour... And this left him completely unhinged. Minute after agonizing minute, he stood facing the ruin's entrance, gripping his hireling by the shoulder, his whole body shaking.   
  
'Do you still want to go in?' she asked softly after he finally calmed down a little; and for once, there was no mockery in her voice.  
  
He nodded, swallowing tears.  
  
'I'll... I'll try to be strong...' he mouthed, forcing himself to stop clinging on to her for support. 'Mjoll would want me to be strong...'  
  
The Dunmer chortled.  
  
'Mjoll would likely want you to stay at home wrapped in a warm blanket, but that is rather beside the point. I say when we enter the ruin, we try sneaking again. So your fragile soul isn't shattered further'.  
  
  
The ruin was stuffy and dusty - and murky: neither the unnatural greenish light from the odd, torch-like Dwarven lamps nor the glow of the fires the bandits had lit was of any help, as the sloping corridors were filled with vapour, too thick for the flame heat to dispel. It gushed, with an ear-splitting whistle, out of the cracks in the massive bronze-coloured pipes running along the walls and ceiling, and mixed with the smoke from the campfires, making it hard to see and breathe.   
  
The Dunmer moved with deliberate slowness, crouching down, pausing after every step; Aerin followed her, gritting his teeth, fighting the resurging wish to straighten up and give his legs a rest - and as, inch by inch, they progressed down the corridor, it seemed to him that he had been caught in some sort of never-ending fever dream.   
  
Whenever the Dunmer stopped to look around, he could see the tips of her pointed, pierced ears twitch slightly... Or maybe it was just an illusion caused by shimmering vapour; maybe they didn't twitch - maybe elves could not move their ears... There was so little he knew about them, after all - despite having grown up in a community with a strong Dunmeri presence... Aerin sank to his knees, no longer able to support his body in a squatting pose. He felt dizzy; his mind wandered from one ridiculous random thought to another; there was... so... little... air...  
  
  
'Hey!' the Dunmer's fierce whisper rolled through his head like thunder. 'Are you gonna be fainting now, too?'  
  
Aerin rubbed his eyes and looked around. He was sitting on the smooth, hard stone floor, bending forward in a most ludicrous way, as if he was praying to the pile of rusty metal cogs in front of him. The stifling haze had cleared a little, and the shrill whistle was gone.  
  
'I used your old clothes - which got half my pack wet, mind you - to patch up the largest hole in the pipe,' the hireling explained, helping Aerin to his feet, her voice still lowered. 'We'll be able to move around better now, with the steam gone. But we've gotta be careful. If there's someone further down the corridor, they might...'  
  
At this moment, as if to provide a conclusion to her phrase, a muffled voice came somewhere out of the darkness ahead of them,  
  
'Hey! There's something wrong with dem pipes!'  
  
The Dunmer froze, for a fraction of a second, and then whipped out her bow. Just as she did, a tall, slightly bow-legged figure emerged into the dim light. She hurried to release the string; the arrow whizzed through the air and sank into the bandit's chest before Aerin had time to as much as swallow the lump in his throat. The figure folded in two as if it was cut out of paper - but the Dunmer did not lower her weapon, her narrowed, ember-like eyes peering into the ruin's depths. Soon, another bandit came out to investigate - and he, too, met his peril, the arrow landing neatly right in the tender flesh of his throat.  
  
It was horrible, abhorrent; Mjoll would probably hate him for it - but as, her face grim and intent, her hand firm and steady, her movements sharp, almost mechanical, the Dunmer felled bandit after bandit with a well-aimed shot, Aerin found himself... awestruck. Enchanted by her calm, cold-blooded professionalism, by her self-assurance and skill. He had felt the same way when he watched Mjoll practice with an axe... But Mjoll was hitting a dummy, which he himself had made for her out of a few cooking pots and a broom handle - and the Dunmer was ending lives! Spilling blood! What was he thinking?! Was it because, unlike in a sword fight, the foes were not dying directly before his eyes? Out of sight, out of mind? No, no, he was not that thoughtless! He realized that the Dunmer's bow was a tool of death, just like her blade... And yet...  
  
'Let's move on,' the hireling said curtly when what appeared to be the last bandit tumbled down, struck between the eyes. 'Try not to trip over the bodies'.  
  
He obeyed, only too gladly. Although it was a colossal effort, not getting his feet entangled in limp dead limbs spread across the floor - it required watching his step and looking down at the fallen... which he could not bring himself to do, because he knew that if he did, he'd burst into uncontrollable sobs. So much death. Their journey had barely started, and there was already so much death.  
  
There was still one time when he had to look; that was when the Dunmer suddenly stopped. He discovered, to his terror and indignation, that she was leaning over the corpse of some bandit that appeared to be wearing better armour than the rest - and poking at him! Rifling through the satchel at his belt! Attempting to pull his boot off!  
  
'What are you doing?!' he asked chokingly. 'Have you no respect for the dead?!'  
  
'Why should I?' she replied, looking up at him with a grin. 'The dead have no respect for me; my grandfather's ghost, for one, keeps pestering me with useless lectures. Ancestor guardian my... Aha!' she jerked her hand out of the bandit's satchel; clasped in between her fingers, glinting temptingly in the uneven light, there was a small key. 'Wonder what this baby opens?'  
  
Aerin pouted.   
  
'We have no time for collecting loot! We are on a mission here!'  
  
She didn't even bother to listen to him, dancing, light-footed, towards a nearby metal door and fitting the key into the lock. The latch clicked softly, and the door slid open. It lead into a room that would have been spacious, if it were not for yet another bunch of thick pipes, which the Dunmer - and a very, very reluctant Aerin - had to squeeze past to get further in. And when they did, the Dunmer clapped her hands against her mouth, rounding her eyes and arching her eyebrows like a startled child; the look on her face was so odd, so unfitting, so unlike her usual confident smirk, that Aerin had to blink several times to make sure he was not seeing things.  
  
This new, outlandish expression was evidently prompted by what the Dunmer saw in the farthest corner of the room. A grey-skinned elf, a kinsman of hers, sitting slouched at a low stone table, staring wearily into nothingness... His face was so haggard, and his blue robes so shabby and tattered, that Aerin pressed his hand against his heart, which had jolted with a sharp pang of pity. Could his hireling be feeling the same? Could she be capable of compassion? He had never thought a rogue like her could actually be sorry for anyone... Did that mean... Perhaps... What if her words at the Riften marketplace had been sincere, after all...  
  
While Aerin was pondering over these philosophical questions, the Dunmer raced up to her kinsman and, taking him by the hand, peered into his face.  
  
'Mal...' she breathed, shaking her head in apparent disbelief.  'You... you look so... unlike your sly old self... What happened? What have those scumbags done to you?'  
  
He started, as though wakened from a dream.   
  
'Illa?' he asked hoarsely; Aerin took mental note of his hireling's name, which she herself had not deigned to tell him. 'After... After all this time... What are you doing here? How did you get past the bandits?'  
  
'Oh, I killed them,' she made an impatient gesture. 'It doesn't matter; I need to know what's wrong with you'.  
  
The elf she had called Mal - Aerin assumed it was Maluril the vase snatcher and thug upsetter - let out a loud groan and, jerking his hand out of Illa's grasp, dug his fingers into his forehead and swayed from side to side.  
  
'This is it,' he muttered, sounding on the verge of tears, 'This is the end...'  
  
Illa grabbed him by the shoulder and snapped,  
  
'What do you mean, this is the end? I just saved your life! These scrib-brains kept you in a locked room - starved you, by the looks of it! And one of them threw a fit when he heard your name, calling you lying and thieving filth!'  
  
'That was because I had promised to pay them for dwarven artifacts, and they found out I had nothing to pay them with,' Maluril explained, with an exasperated sigh. 'You don't understand, Illa. Those outlaws were my meatshield. I was hiding among them, and now that they are dead...'  
  
'Hiding from what?' she interrupted.  
  
Aerin shifted his weight from one foot to another. This was beginning to sound like a very private conversation, which made him feel uncomfortable - as if he was intruding. But despite the steady crimson flame devouring his cheeks and neck, despite the nagging voice of his conscience urging him to step out of the room and let the two elves have their talk undisturbed, he stayed where he was - curious, quite in spite of himself,  about what would happen next.  
  
Maluril looked up at Illa, his lips trembling, and began to speak. His voice was faltering, at times fading to a barely audible moan, and Aerin noticed that he was tearing at the flesh round his fingernails, something that he himself did quite often when nervous.  
  
'After you went back to Skyrim, I went about the usual business on my own. But... it was not the same without you... You know I am more of a plan-maker than a burglar; without your skills, I was lost... I got caught red-handed... upset some wrong people... There were... consequences... I had to flee across the border. You see...' Maluril took a huge, ravenous gulp of air, as if he was drowning. 'The man I was trying to... operate on... said he would send the Dark Brotherhood after me'.  
  
Illa snorted contemptuously.   
  
'This is hardly worth losing your head over! You know that the Dark Brotherhood is like the bogeyman - folks waggle their tongues about it, but few would have the guts to actually go and do the Sacrament thing - if it even works...'  
  
Maluril's lips twisted into a bitter smile.  
  
'Soon after I got to Skyrim,' he said, his voice hollow and monotonous, 'I had a dream. I saw a man, a Redguard... He stared right at me, out of some kind of dark, starry precipice, and said, loud and clear, 'So begins a contract, bounded in blood'. They are after me, Illa... There is no escape...'  
  
For what seemed to Aerin like an eternity, Illa stared at Maluril without uttering a word; then, suddenly, she reached into her sizeless backpack, fished out the sizeable coinpurse Aerin had given her as an advance on her fee, and thrust it into Maluril's hands. After a swift glance around, she grabbed a quill and a sheet of parchment that were lying, among other chaotic clutter, on Maluril's table, and started scribbling something in bold, slanting, hurried handwriting. Aerin drew closer and stood on tiptoe behind the elves' backs; this allowed him to make out the following message,  
  
 _Tonilia,_  
  
The bearer of this letter is an old friend of mine in dire need of assistance. Please provide him with a loan of 1,000 septims.  
  
I will take it upon myself to return the entire amount, plus interest: I will be giving you all my loot for free until the debt is covered.   
  
To prove that this is not a scam, I place a Shadowmark on the letter (here she quickly dashed down an odd-looking symbol - a circle inside a triangle).  
  
Shadow hide you,  
  
Dragonling  
  
After she finished writing, Illa folded the letter in two and handed it to Maluril, who was still gaping at Aerin's coinpurse, and said abruptly,  
  
'Go to Riften. Head down to the Ratway. In the Ragged Flagon, find a Redguard fence and show her this. She'll give you some money to add to my little sack of gold. Then, talk to the creepy lady in the white robe; she usually hangs out somewhere around the Flagon. She is a face sculptor; she'll make you unrecognizable, so that no assassin will ever track you down. This purse, plus what the fence gives you, will be enough to pay the sculptor, and to get you out of Skyrim. Riften is close to the Morrowind border, so I suggest you head there. Visit the land of the ancestors and whatnot. Maybe I'll drop by and see you some time - you'll just have to tell me your new name'.  
  
Aerin shook his head like a dog getting water out of his ears. Unbelievable! His hireling, who had haggled with him for her fee till he came dangerously close to bursting into tears and crying out 'Not fair!'; who had not missed a single chance to remind him that he still owed her half of the promised sum; who, in her own words, was going to charge him for that stupid glass armour - giving up all her precious loot, just like that, to rescue her friend from assassins? The guilt he felt at thinking of her as 'low-life Ratway scum' was so painful that he actually whimpered a little.  
  
In the meanwhile, Maluril sat frozen, with a vague, wandering smile on his face, as though he was having a very, very happy dream. Illa grinned at his dazed expression - and added, her eyes alight with a warm, liquid glow that made Aerin's palms sweat, 'One last thing. For good luck'.  
  
With those words, she bent down - and kissed Maluril full on the mouth.  
  
Petrified, breathless, clutching his stomach to contain the whirlwind of butterflies, Aerin watched the two Dunmer take slow, luxuriant bites at each other's lips, their eyes burning a fierce, scorching red beneath lowered eyelashes, their breaths moulding together into a single low, prolonged sigh - and before he could stop himself, before his mind ordered an immediate purge of such sinful thoughts, he found himself picturing his own lips in place of Maluril's, and Mjoll's in place of Illa's...  
  
He was still captivated by this inappropriate, immoral... magical vision when Illa gave him a rather painful poke in the ribs and, with a slight jerk of her head, motioned him to follow her out of Maluril's room and deeper into the ruin. As they left the male Dunmer, now revived and full of energy, to gathering his few worldly belongings for the journey to Riften, Aerin dared to address his hireling with a tentative question,  
  
'Is he the one?'  
  
Illa chuckled.  
  
'You sound like a character out of one of those look-alike stories where a child from a prophecy has to save the world!'  
  
Aerin coughed sheepishly and passed his hand across the back of his neck.  
  
'I mean... Back in Riften...' There it was; he had started tearing at his fingers. 'You said... You said you knew what it's like to be... in love... I was wondering if Maluril...'  
  
She let out a loud, spluttering snort of laughter.  
  
'Mal? My one true love? Gods no! We are just friends with benefits! Tell you what,' she narrowed her eyes to sparkling ruby half-moons, 'How about when we stop to make camp, I take out my flask, and get really, really drunk, and start feeling sorry for myself, and tell you all about my ruined marriage, hmm?'  
  
Sweet mother Mara, it was so hard determine whether she was joking or serious! Aerin did not even bother trying.


	4. Chapter 4

Presently, the corridor opened into a spacious chamber, separated from the rest of the ruin by a metal gate, which Illa pushed open with a light touch of her fingertips. For a few seconds, the mercenary stood on the threshold, Aerin hovering apprehensively behind her back, and peered into the greyish, misty murk that enveloped the crumbling stone ledges, the jagged outlines of ancient stairways and the massive square columns. Everything around them was still and eerily quiet, as if the walls had been lined with cotton wool.  
  
'I don't like this,' Illa muttered, clenching her fingers round her sword handle.  
  
Aerin poked his head over her shoulder and pointed at some odd dark shapes that lay on the floor ahead of them.   
  
'I'll... I'll go and investigate those,' he said, clearing his throat.   
  
He had not been at his manliest so far, and now was as good a time as any to stop acting like a wimp. To the White with his fear, with his fluttering heart, with his sticky palms and numb feet! He could do this. Take a bold step ahead. Ignore Illa's hiss-like demand to 'get back here'. Glance down. Push back the wave of nausea - of course, given his bad luck, what else could those dark shapes be but more dead bodies? Keep his eyes open. Keep his eyes open, dammit! Keep looking at the bodies. Fight the urge to turn away. There was no clanking sound behind his back; he did not have to glance around in search of its source - he was just inventing excuses to look anywhere else but at the bodies! He had to stop doing that! Stop doing that. Focus on the bodies. Kneel next to them. Gather all his scattered knowledge of healing lore. Attempt to determine the cause of death: if Maluril had been locked up in his room, and Illa had not reached this chamber until now - who... or what... else could have ended those poor souls' lives? Examine - examine the wounds. Strange... Very strange...  
  
Congratulating himself on having made an important discovery, Aerin prepared to get up and draw Illa's attention to the largish puncture marks on the bandits' chests - left by some kind of gigantic needle, by the looks of it - but then, something pushed him in the back with a force that hurtled him across the chamber.   
  
As, groggy with the impact, he got to his feet and blinked a few times, he was able to make out a few colourful blurs clashing together with a clamour that made a broad crack run along the middle of his skull   - or so it seemed to him. Swaying, groping at thin air for support, he drew closer. The details of the blurs sharpened; it turned out that he was looking at Illa - once again transformed into a furious whirlwind, hacking with her sword at a bizarre metal construct... Half-sphere, half-humanoid figure, with a mask-like, horrifyingly expressionless face and long arms that ended in nightmarish clusters of weapons - including a huge metal spike, which, his heart sinking, Aerin recognized as the 'needle' that had pierced the bandits.   
  
She must have hit some kind of important joint in the thing's, er, structure - for it suddenly made a loud creaking sound and swayed from side to side, a thin trickle of dark, foul-smelling, oily substance oozing down its front. Illa swung her blade up high, preparing to finish the automaton off - but Aerin rejoiced only for a brief moment. While fighting this nightmarish, inhuman warrior, she had been closely followed by a large metal ball, which rolled around behind her back with the same faint clanking that Aerin had thought to be a figment of his imagination. And now, letting off a small jet of steam, it opened up, like some monstrous flower bud, and unfolded into a second automaton, almost a complete copy of the first, which lifted its spike-like arm, ready to thrust it into Illa's back. She was wearing a set of light, tight-fitting armour, the trademark of her guild - Aerin's glass cuirass had absorbed the construct’s blow, but this bunch of straps and pockets would not...  
  
With a loud, incoherent yell, Aerin leapt at the sphere warrior, grabbed at its cold, slippery chest - if you could call it a chest  - from behind... And remained hanging there, his arms locked tightly round the automaton, his legs dangling ridiculously in the air, the cogs and gears of the strange mechanism pressing painfully into his body through the gaps in his armour. Illa whirled around, her eyes widening in alarm - and jabbed at the thinnest part of the construct, where the human-like half was linked to the sphere. Aerin hurried to let go, as the metal warrior started hissing and gushing out steam and oil. He dropped to the floor, rolled over several times and remained lying there, face up, watching the struggle that unfolded above. Once again, he felt as though in a dream; all of this seemed so unreal - Illa's sword grinding against the automaton's mechanic arm, sparks flying in all directions, a twisted living face leaning towards an impenetrably calm metal mask... The fact that, his head still woozy from the construct's blow, Aerin perceived everything in slow motion, didn't help any.  
  
It must have taken a century before Illa's furious blow with her blade's pommel finally made the sphere warrior lean to one side and clank down to the ground, reduced, in a flash, from a fearsome foe to a motionless pile of metal... Which Aerin even dared to kick when he staggered up. The plan was to give himself a confidence boost - but it failed miserably, because Aerin stubbed his toe. He was still leaping on one spot, shaking his foot and repeating 'Ouch, ouch, ouch!' over and over under his breath, when Illa bumped her fist playfully against his shoulder and said, chuckling,  
  
'Well, well, I think you are getting the hang of being brave!'  
  
Lowering his injured foot, Aerin sniffed loudly and opened and closed his mouth, fish-like, in an attempt to tell her to stop mocking him - but no sound came out. Illa's face clouded; she moved her hand to his shoulder and said,  
  
'By the Three, you are so pale! Even by human standards! Hold on a second...'  
  
Yet again, she dove inside her trusty sizeless backpack - it had to be enchanted for sure, for otherwise Aerin could not fathom how she went about with such a dance-like spring in her step, completely unhindered by the rattling paraphernalia behind her shoulders. She emerged with a small phial of thick, greenish liquid, which she uncorked and most unceremoniously shoved into Aerin's mouth. He had no choice but to swallow the goo-like mass that enveloped his tongue like the waters of the marsh they had had to cross. As the potion made its slurping journey down to his stomach, Aerin felt the invisible heavy cast-iron helmet lifted off his head, and smiled, taking in a huge, grateful breath of air.  
  
'What is this concoction?' he asked, as he and Illa set on their journey again.  
  
She jerked her shoulder,  
  
'A modest little invention of my own. A bunch of herbs and shrooms, with a hint of random body parts taken from wilderness critters, and just a tincy-wincy dash of Skooma...'  
  
Aerin stopped in his tracks, his jaw dropping. Illa savoured the horrified look on his face and the sound of his violent choking, and then said,  
  
'I was just joking; relax! No Skooma for you, oh no - what if you think I'm Mjoll and propose to me or something?'  
  
Aerin let out a quiet, tremulous, sheepish giggle. Illa followed suit, and soon, merging together, their giggles grew into loud, hearty laughter, which swelled like a river during a flood, lapping against the solemn walls of the Dwarven ruin, flooding the dreary chambers, coursing through the dusty corridors in a sparkling wave... Their cheeks flushing, tears quivering on their eyelashes, they kept laughing till they entered the next hall.  
  
This part of the ruin was divided into several sections, bordered by thin metal bars, with a large lever in the centre of each. Beyond the bars and the levers, there was a tall metal door. Aerin swivelled his head round eagerly; for once, their way was barred by an obstacle that challenged their wits, not their swords (or sword, rather; he was still unarmed - he could have looted an axe or a blade from one of the bandits, but the very thought sickened him). He was on his home turf here; he had spent many a lonely afternoon poring over tomes on the secrets of ancient Nordic puzzle doors and reading the Yellow Book of Riddles, over and over and over again... He could finally be of use!  
  
'Looks like some sort of puzzle,' he said, coming closer to the nearest section and peering at the lever through the bars.  
  
Illa made a rather rude sound - as far as Aerin was concerned - with her lips.  
  
'You call this a puzzle? Please! You know what a real puzzle is? A lock that will blow up in your face if you don't get the combination right; a trigger of a trap that will send stones showering down if you don't disarm it; a safe that you have to crack in the five minutes it takes for the guard to return from his break...'  
  
Aerin watched her closely as she made this list, holding his breath with astonishment. Her expression had grown soft, dreamy - she evidently enjoyed tackling the kinds of contraptions she'd just described. Enjoyed walking on the razor's edge, being on the verge of danger... He suddenly remembered that the fire in her eyes when she hid in the shadows, watching the approaching bandits, risking being seen at any moment, had been the same as when she was kissing Maluril. There was so much about this strange Dunmer that he did not understand...  
  
Another clattering plunge into the backpack's depths yielded a long coil of rope with a metal hook attached to it. Her every motion followed by Aerin's rounded, unblinking eyes, Illa carefully spread the rope out on the floor and moved her hand slowly over it, a faint green light twisting round her fingers. Twitching and swaying like a wakening serpent, the rope rose into the air; smirking at Aerin's stifled 'Wow', Illa guided it through the bars of the first section, then across the section after it, further and further, towards the closed door.  
  
'This thing is not a puzzle,' she said calmly, as the rope snaked its way past one railing after another. 'This is a trifle; child's play. See that big red valve at the end there, a little to the door's left?' Aerin nodded. 'Obviously, all of this lever malarkey has been put up by the dwarves to stop us from reaching it. Ergo... Gods, I love that Imperial word! Learned it from my arresting officer in the Cyrodiil capital; he had the most succulent cleft chin... Ergo, the valve is the key to this entire mechanism. Ergo... Got it!'  
  
Clinking faintly, the hook caught against the red metal curve; Illa gave the rope a swift tug; with an ear-splitting grinding sound, the valve turned, and the bars of the railing slid into their sockets, clearing the way towards the door.   
  
'Told you so,' Illa grinned, picking up the rope, and strolled forward, swaying her hips in a way that seemed to Aerin to be very, very deliberate... Oh gods, not that accursed blush again!  
  
As the door swung open, its hinges creaking softly, it revealed a round stone platform, completely barren save for an even larger lever in its middle. Aerin stretched out his hand, still determined to make at least some contribution to their progress through the ruin - but Illa grabbed him by the wrist.  
  
'I say it's about time we took a little break,' she said, her tone even yet very firm. 'I've seen thingummies like this one before; it's a dwarven elevator. It has to lead further down - and we will need all our strength if we want to go further down'.  
  
'Why?' Aerin mouthed, feeling his heart crawl into some remote corner of his body and hide there, fluttering. 'What... What is further down? More of those sphere things?'  
  
'Could be,' Illa replied evasively, turning her back on him under the pretext of going through her innumerable belongings. 'Let's not think about it now - you know what they say about crossing bridges, right? I don’t want you in hysterics before we actually come down. Just think of Mjoll and how proud you want to make her, okay?'  
  
'Okay,' Aerin echoed weakly, nestling, cross-legged, on the floor. For a while, there was silence - somewhat strained - as Illa rummaged through her backpack and Aerin watched her from beneath half-lowered eyelids. He had no idea how long they had been inside the ruin, but it was only now that he suddenly realized how terribly tired he was. All that sneaking and fighting and trying to act like a real man...  
  
'Ah, there it is!' Illa exclaimed, turning back towards Aerin and thrusting a fuzzy bundle into his hands. 'A warm blanket for my cherished employer!'  
  
'Will you charge me extra for it too?' Aerin asked as he wrapped himself into a large, cozy goat-wool cocoon.   
  
Illa smiled, 'Maybe I will, maybe I won't. Here,' she seated herself next to Aerin pushed her amazing backpack closer to him. 'There's some food in there if you are hungry. Honey nut treats, mostly. Maybe some leftover pie, if it wasn't squished by the sphere'.  
  
Aerin accepted the offer with silent but enthusiastic gratitude.   
  
'You'd make a terrible mother,' he remarked teasingly, tearing into the half-crushed, oldish, but still delicious honey nut treat. 'Feeding people with sweets instead of greens!'  
  
It had to be the first time he had made a joke in Illa's presence - the first time he had made a joke in the past few weeks, actually. It could have been their recent fit of laughter, or the comfortable warmth round his shoulders and inside his stomach - for whichever reason, he was beginning to feel more at ease. True, there was the thought of some unknown danger lurking below the stone platform, and the burning shame at not having proved himself yet - but this... sitting opposite Illa, not bothered by bandits or ancient killing machines, tucking into a sticky, sugary snack... this felt good. Relaxing. He thought it might be fitting for him to make some sort of casual remark - but the moment he did, he immediately regretted it.  
  
A tiny tick shooting through the corner of her mouth, Illa hugged her knees and said quietly, appearing to be talking to herself rather than Aerin,  
  
'My husband wanted us to have a child... No Altmer would ever have dreamt of mixing his blood with... how'd they call it... a lesser being... His kin would have turned their backs on him... But he loved me too much to care... I told him I wasn't ready... Not cut out for the responsibility... Sometimes I think that if I agreed... If I bore his child and learned to care for it... Things would've been different...'  
  
'Illa?' Aerin called out tentatively, touching her forearm with his fingertips - and mentally cursing himself for having been so stupid. Still, he managed to register, at the back of his head, that he had addressed her by her name. 'Have I... said something wrong? I am sorry; I had no idea'.  
  
She jerked her head up and forced a smile.  
  
'You want to know what I'm mumbling about? Let me tell you a little bedtime story'.  
  
That was a little unexpected; but surprised as he was, Aerin said nothing and obediently prepared to listen.  
  
Illa shut her eyes and began; her voice, rich and deep as always, sounded just a tiny bit strained, as if she was struggling with tears,  
  
 _'Once upon a time, there was a little creeping plant - let's say, ivy. It lived in a dark, cold ravine, overgrown with weeds, where the sun did not reach. It was a dirty, ugly place, and the passersby spat in disgust at the plants that grew there. The little ivy struggled as hard as it could for survival, and yearned for a chance to get out of the ravine, to where there were lush green meadows and tall trees, reaching out with their branches to the blue, blue sky..._  
  
'And one day, the ivy saw a mighty oak; it was the most beautiful tree it had ever seen, and its majestic crown of leaves rose high to the highest clouds, and basked in the rays of the sun. And the ivy crept up to the oak, and ensnared its roots and trunk, and the oak carried it out of the ravine to a warm, bright new world.  
  
'The oak cared for the little ivy, and shielded it from the wind with its strong branches, and let it drink the rich juices mother earth fed it with, and its leaves fluttered in the gentle breeze and whispered to the ivy how beautiful it was... And so, the ivy felt guilty about using the oak to get out of the ravine; it knew that it was unworthy of the great love the oak had given it, and would never be able to return it... And it crept down from the oak's trunk, and returned to the ground where it belonged.  
  
'Sometimes, when it looks up at the sky from the gutter where it has made its home, the ivy can still see the oak; it longs to return to it, to feel its love again - but it cannot. For the ivy loves the oak too, in its own way, and it would rather whither and die than hurt it again...'  
  
As she progressed with her tale, it became more and more difficult for her to keep from sobbing. As her final words trailed off into a faint whisper, her red eyes were dimmed by a thick pearly film; she blinked it off and laughed - an unnatural, hollow laugh,  
  
'See? And I didn't even have to get drunk'.  
  
Before either of them knew what he was doing, Aerin shifted closer to Illa and put his arms around her and kept them woven round her shoulders, without saying a single word, till the two of them drifted off to sleep... Aerin's last thought before the gates of dreamland closed behind him was that this had to be the first time his hireling was sleeping with someone in a completely innocent sense...


	5. Chapter 5

'So now you know all about me,' Illa said as a way of greeting, as soon as Aerin tore open his eyes and stretched himself cautiously with a small, unobtrusive yawn. 'You have seen my soft side. Which puts you in a very special category, along with Faendal of Riverwood. He witnessed me melt down when I met my very first boyfriend...' She rolled up her eyes and sighed with mock wistfulness. 'The smooth-tongued son of a scrib had talked me into eloping with him and joining a bandit clan... But my father just happened to be sober for once and managed to stop me - and then, the fetcher took off anyway. Robbed me of my virtue - that's what they call it, right? - my childhood dream, and most of my money. And then, years later, I bumped into him in a Nordic barrow, saved him from a giant spider, was dragged into his ridiculous treasure-hunting scheme... only to have him double-cross me again and be offed by a draugr right before my eyes. Nasty bit of business. But hey!' She clapped her hand against her forehead. 'I'm rambling again, aren't I? I shall stop now, and you... You can use these horrid insights to blackmail me, in which case I will have to dump you into Lake Honrich, or be a good boy and never bring them up, ever'.  
  
She had been smiling while speaking - her usual smug smile; Aerin had never thought he would be so happy to see it return. A snide, derisive, cheeky Illa - just like anyone else in the world that had but a dash more self-confidence than he did - made him cough and blush and grow all tongue-tied and pathetic; but a melancholy, tearful Illa - just like anyone else in the world that was hurt and suffering - wrung his heart like a wet towel. It was a relief to wake up and find her back to normal.  
  
Together, they rolled up the blanket and packed it away into Illa's magical backpack,  and cleared up the messy remains of Aerin's snack. Then, straightening up and standing opposite each other in the centre of the stone platform, they drew a deep breath - and with a curt nod at Aerin, Illa pulled at the lever and mouthed,  
  
'Brace yourself'.  
  
The very walls round them seemed to shake as the slumbering cogs of the Dwemer mechanism woke up and ground into motion; the deafening noise that the elevator made, sinking lower and lower beneath the stone floor, made Aerin scream noiselessly and clutch at his head. But just as he began to feel his temples crack under pressure, the upper level of the ruin slipped completely out of sight, and the light and the noise were replaced by silent darkness. They had arrived.  
  
With a swift snap of her fingers, Illa lit up a small orb of soft blue light over her head. It hovered round them, like one of those large nocturnal moths that always made Aerin shriek when they suddenly came bursting in through the window - and cast a pale, ghostly glow on their surroundings. The elevator had taken them to some kind of vast underground cavern, half-submerged in still, inky-black water that lapped, with a sigh-like sound, against the foundations of tall, slightly lopsided, blind-windowed towers, and caressed them with fingers of cold white vapour. It was as if Aerin had been plunged, head-first, into a terrifying campfire story, and those murky halls were the native home of the ghost that first glides through the town gates, then floats down the street towards your house, then knocks on your door calling your name...  
  
Just like when they caught their first glimpse of the ruin, while Aerin was gawking at the sombre stone structures around him, Illa was interested in something much more practical. When he came to his senses a little, he found her facing a nearby wall, sword bared, cursing under her breath. Hanging over her head, was a gigantic, bulbous, slimy growth, sticking to a wall like an oversized Nordic barnacle.  
  
'What... What is this thing?' Aerin asked breathlessly, tiptoeing closer.  
  
Illa glanced at him over her shoulder, eyebrows knitted.  
  
'On second thought, I probably should have warned you about the kinds of things that live down here...' she said.  
  
Before Aerin as much as dared to start wheezing out a response, the growth on the wall suddenly came alive. It burst open at the end, like the maw of some primeval sightless monster, and started coughing up a whole torrent of creatures the likes of which Aerin had never seen before. Vaguely humanoid, with pointed ears, mouthfuls of tiny, razor-sharp teeth and raw skin folds where their eyes should have been, they landed on the floor with sharp, guttural screeches and, circling round Illa on half-bent legs, swarmed over her, overwhelmed her, suffocate her in a twisting net of glistening, gnarled, greyish limbs... She fought back desperately, making the creatures hiss and spit at her blade stung them like fierce lightning - but they were relentless, pouring over her in a slithering wave...  
  
Aerin covered his eyes and whimpered in terror. Suddenly, a loud sniff-like sound burst through the overall clamour of the battle. One of those blind monstrosities must have heard him and was now taking in his smell. He peered into the semi-darkness apprehensively through half-parted fingers. Sure enough, there it was, hobbling from the writhing heap of bodies towards him, snorting in the damp air through its enormous slit-like nostrils. Petrified with fear, his gaze fixed on the creature's abhorrent, twisted features, he did not move until it was too late. A soft pounce - and the creature was on top of him, groping at his armour. It hissed in rage as its long pale fingers found nothing but cold, hard glass - and moved its hands upwards, towards Aerin's face. His whole body erupting into a noiseless screech of horror, he envisioned those clammy claws finding his eyes - and tearing into them, squeezing them out, turning his face into a bloodied, blind mask, like the one of the fingers' owner...  
  
  
'About damn time you answered my summons, you old s'wit!'  
  
The horrid hands gripping his face released their clutch; through a teary haze, Aerin saw a raging red-gold flame erupt right in the creatures' midst. He had read somewhere that all cave dwellers hate and fear fire - apparently, this was more than true. The creatures scattered away from the flame with terrified grunts - but it chased them down, and enveloped them whole, and held them in its scorching embrace, kicking and shrieking, till they dropped down on the floor, motionless, silenced forever. When the tears rolled down his cheeks and he could see again, he gasped and scrambled to his feet, rubbing his eyes with his fists. The merciless flame that, one by one, tore the monstrous creatures' lives out of them - was Illa. Her head up high, her face hard-lined and fierce, she walked cloaked in tongues of fire that licked her limbs without hurting them - and burned her foes whenever they dared to draw near. Her hair stood on end, looking like a burst of flames, and her eyes were flooded with a blinding golden glow. After the last creature fell, she stood in silence for a few moments, opposite a stunned, speechless Aerin - a spirit of vengeance casting one last glance on the battlefield... And then, the illusion faded; the flaming aura dissolved, and his sharp-tongued Dunmer hireling was back.  
  
'Ugh, my head hurts so much after these little shows,' she muttered, ruffling her hair.  
  
Aerin pointed first at Illa, then at the dead bodies, then back at Illa again, blinking slowly.  
  
She chuckled and folded her arms on her chest.  
  
'Quite a display, huh? Delivered to you courtesy of my grandfather's spirit. He is supposed to guide me and guard me and aid me in battle. But the old stiff won't let me do this fiery gig more than once a day - says I like it too much and it worries him or some such nonsense. I think he is just lazy; I bet every time I summon him, I distract him from cheating on my grandmother with the spirit of some warrior princess from the First Era!'  
  
'You... You talk to your grandfather's ghost?' Aerin asked, backing away instinctively.  
  
Illa grinned radiantly.  
  
'All the time. He is a crusty old bore; thinks I am a disgrace to the bloodline - which I know I am, but does he really have to remind me? Every. Single. Day?'  
  
Aerin longed to ask her to tell him more about her peculiar relative - but she pressed her finger against her lips.  
  
'Let's talk after we are done with all the Falmer, mmm?'  
  
Aerin nodded, with a shudder. So that was how the sightless creatures were called.  
  
They walked in silence - crossing bridge after sloping bridge. Taking their time to explore the ruined towers - after a while, Aerin had given up trying to stop Illa from looting everything that was not nailed down and just pranced impatiently behind her back as she knelt next to yet another Dwarven chest with a brain-wreckingly complex lock mechanism, which she cracked before the final verse of whatever song she was whistling. And sending any unfriendly denizens whizzing down into the water with a well-aimed arrow... Well, all right; Illa did the well-aimed-arrow part - Aerin, in turn, excelled at not squeaking whenever the black waves swallowed a pallid, long-limbed body, with a gulp of satisfaction. Much as he detested all this killing business, he forced himself to watch Illa's every move - not without a bit of guilty admiration - for each time he lost concentration on whatever was happening around him, his mind returned to the image of a Falmer sitting on his chest, breathing raspingly into his face, its fingers searching for his eyes... Illa was right; if she had told his beforehand what kind of monstrosities they were in for meeting, he would have rolled around on the floor in a tantrum, pounding the stone with his fists and refusing to go any further.  
  
'Do you think that's the last of them?' he asked shakily when Illa finally lowered her bow.  
  
'Wouldn't bet on it,' she replied darkly. 'From what I've seen of the Falmer, they tend to have pets'.  
  
Pets... Oh gods... Aerin felt the ground whirl away from beneath his feet. Pets! He could only imagine what kind of beastly beings those creatures would choose as their companions!   
  
When the sound came, he had already worked himself into a half-hysterical state, and hearing it - a gentle, rustling patter somewhere in the darkness - he bolted into the air with an almost girlish shriek.  
  
'Is that... Is that them?' he choked, his teeth chattering in tone with that terrifying, blood-curdling sound (terrifying and blood-curdling in his mind, anyway).  
  
Illa bit into her lips and aimed at the whispering murk - but the creature that made the sound was faster than her. It charged at them - a giant insect with a gleaming armour of seemingly rock-hard plates - clicking its mandibles hungrily. Before Illa could swap her bow for her sword, it lunged at her, its pincers sinking into her stomach like a pair of dark, curved daggers. Aerin looked on blankly as the insect began spitting some dark-green, rancid liquid right into Illa's wound, paralyzing her, sucking away the last few remnants of her conscience... She struggled to break free at first, but her movements grew slower by the minute, till finally, her fingers twitched in one last desperate effort to grasp at her sword hilt - and froze.  
  
'No!' Aerin cried out in desperation and disbelief. 'No!'  
  
The insect lifted its ugly head from Illa's limp, lifeless body and, pattering over to Aerin, drew itself up to its full height and remained in this pose for a few minutes, its countless tiny legs twitching in the air, its mandibles dripping with blood and venom.  
  
Aerin felt like fainting. This was all wrong, so wrong... Illa, his trusty hireling who had braved all the dangers on their way with a smug grin and a dubious anecdote for every occasion, now lay wounded, probably even dead - and he stood face to face with one of his worst nightmares. Was this how it was all going to end? Was he to become bug food? A fitting fate for someone like him...  
  
'No,' he repeated through gritted teeth; this time, there was no pain and fear in his voice - there was anger, and determination. 'No!'  
  
Without thinking, without pausing for breath, his mind engulfed in a flame akin to Illa's ancestral magic, he grabbed at a heavy stone carving that lay in a nearby pile of rubble - the impenetrably calm, slightly haughty face of some long-forgotten Dwarven warlord - lifted it up high in his quivering, aching arms, and brought it down on the insect with a loud splat.   
  
As life ebbed away out of the creature, in a slow trickle of green slime that wound its way across the floor from beneath the stone, so did Aerin's suddenly found strength. His knees giving way, he sank down onto the floor next to Illa - and stared at her, refusing to believe that the ghastly, ashen pallor of her face really meant what it had to mean...


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The sudden change in perspective and tense is because this is a fever dream Illa is having under the influence of the Chaurus' poision.

She spurs the honey-coated stallion with her heels, making him reel to his hind legs with a loud neigh, and then lets him charge downhill, the rhythmic beat of his hooves drowning out the distant cries of the Black-Briar mercenaries. The wind slaps her burning face with an invisible cold hand; head thrown back, she welcomes its touch, letting it play with her hair and dry the sweat off her forehead.   
  
That damn fever - if only she had not run out of cure disease potions... The stupid bear just had to scratch her at the most inconvenient moment! Jobs have been piling up sky-high of late, and what with no time to pay a visit to a herbalist - she does not believe in Temple blessings, oh no, not her! - she is forced to do them with a burning pain coursing, river-like, up and down her spine and eating away at her ribs. It gets even worse after sundown, when the air is colder and the fire within her bones clashes with the benumbing chill steeping through her skin. She has not had a decent night's sleep for what seems like centuries, and had to resolve to sucking a pinch of moonsugar under her tongue in order not to doze off while picking locks. What a sight she would have made, snoring with her cheek squished against the chest lid!.. And to cap it all, the damn pain has completely ruined the thrill of what was supposed to be her favourite job! Despite being Thieves Guild through and through, she has no love for Maven Black-Briar, and was looking forward to whisking off her prized stallion right from under her nose. But all her elation is gone now; she is too consumed by the fever to think about anything but her crackling bones; the pain has extinguished every last spark of excitement.  
  
But it's not for long now, not for long; this is her last task for today - after she hands the stolen horse over to the buyer, she will be free to go, and stock up on skeever hide and mudcrab chitin at Elgrim's, and brew herself a nice, warm, frothing concoction, which will kick the accursed malady out of her body...  
  
  
  
The stallion slants his eye at her in alarm as she grips on tightly to his mane. Must... not... fall off...Why do his sides have to be so sleek and fat, like a slide, making it so hard for her to hold on?! The beastie sure lived it up at old Maven's... She should have taken the time to harness him before snatching him from the stables - but the mercenaries were breathing down her neck, and she was afraid that if she lingered, she would collapse... It takes her colossal effort to remain conscious, to focus her mind, not to drown in the seething caldera of pain. _Just... a little... further..._  
  
She almost misses the secluded birch grove where she and her buyer agreed to meet. Her forehead has started sweating again; the salty droplets trickle down into her eyes, stinging them and turning everything around her into shimmering blurs, grey and brown and bright gold. After a few minutes of steering her horse blindly through some shrubs - she can feel their branches scratch at her unarmoured knees - she jerks her head to clear her vision and, realizing that she is about to take the wrong turn, hurries to grab at a few soft, pale-ivory strands of the stallion's mane and tug at them, making him whirl round and gallop in the direction of the landmark log the buyer described to her.  
  
Having reached the meeting spot, she dismounts - and drops to her knees, her legs no longer able to support her. The pain in her back and limbs resurges with a renewed force; it is as if she had been placed inside one of those iron maiden contraptions she saw once in the Thalmor dungeons - while rescuing that hot-headed Nord boy, what was his name - the one with gorgeous hair... Or was it his brother that had gorgeous hair... Or was it someone else entirely... She cannot remember. She cannot remember anything but the pain. The pain has always been there. Outlining the boundaries of her world with a wall of flames. Melting her bones away. Flowing through her veins, pouring into her blood and turning it to acid. Tearing loud, strained groans out of her throat - groans that eventually turn into a hoarse scream that raises a fluttering cloud of frightened birds off the branches of a tree behind her back. Or is it to her left? Her right? Right in front of her? She can no longer tell.  
  
Somewhere in another plane of existence, a frostbite spider patters out of the undergrowth. Neighing shrilly, the horse bolts and, before the creature has time to spit its milky venom, crushes it with his hooves. She watches the struggle dumbly, not even trying to stand up and interfere, hypnotized by the steady movements of the stallion's legs, as he stomps on the spider's bristly body, up-down, up-down, squelch-crack-splat... She can still hear the echo of the spider's chitin bursting long after it curls up dead on the carpet of fallen leaves; the sound rings through her head, silencing the faltering voices of her last conscious thoughts...  
  
  
'Ah! Here he is! Frost, the finest breeding stallion is Skyrim! Didn't think you could pull it off!'  
  
She is brought back to reality by the sound of her buyer's voice. So the balding, pink-hided little sleazebag has finally deigned to arrive. Tearing open her parched lips and forcing her mind to remain at least half-awake, she prepares a sarcastic retort. Of course she pulled it off; she brought him his precious stallion; never mind her rolling around on the ground in agony... It all sounds so perfect in her head - but the rasping gurgle that she manages to produce is less than inadequate.  
  
The human - Azura curse him! - does not even bother to look at her. He has brought his own harness, and is busy saddling Frost, cooing something into his twitching ear. Only after he climbs onto the stallion's back, he casts a glance down at her piteous, writhing little self, from the height of his mount.  
  
'You look a bit off,' he remarks indifferently, playing with the reins. 'You should probably see a healer'.  
  
She glares at him silently and digs her nails deep into the soft, peaty soil. If only she could stand up and slap the fetcher in the face!  
  
'Don't count on me taking you to one, though,' he goes on, his tone still infuriatingly even. 'I can't be seen riding Frost round Riften - you understand. Besides,' he smiles and strokes the horse's neck, 'How do I know that you are not pretending, that this is not some kind of trick to catch me off-guard and steal Frost from me? Can't put that past you Thieves Guild types, now can I?'  
  
And without another word, he jerks at the reins and rides off towards a flaming horizon, leaving her all alone in a burning, smouldering forest, her body engulfed in a wild blaze. Fire. Fire all round her. Destroying. Devouring. _Fire..._  
  
  
  
'Welcome back, Illari'.  
  
A crisp, clean robe, obviously not one of her own, hugging her weary body. Soft, cool, well-washed linen. A rolled up towel on her forehead, moist and smelling of herbs. Dim golden light caressing the walls and the furniture, dancing on the water jug at her bedside. All of this has caught her completely unawares, pouncing at her like a sabre cat on a hunt. Knitting her eyebrows, she rifles desperately through her memory, but, try as she might, she cannot find anything that might explain her sudden arrival at this place, whatever it is. Looks too ordinary to be the afterlife, so odds are, she is not dead yet... But how in Oblivion..?  
  
'I know you must be wondering what happened to you...'  
  
By the Three, she knows that voice! And that face! That smiling, ridiculously righteous face hovering in front of her... Dinya! Dinya the goody-two-shoes little priestess! So this has to be... the Temple of Mara! Some sort of back room, where the priests live - no wonder she did not recognize it straight away. She has only been here once before, and at the time, she was too busy to case the joint. Dremora's underpants, talk about turns of fate!  
  
'A lot of people are puzzled when they wake up from such prolonged delirium...'  
  
She narrows her eyes and shoots a quick, suspicious glance at Dinya, while in the back of her head, a gleeful voice sings how utterly wonderful it is to be in command of her mind and body again.   
  
'Define _prolonged'._  
  
The priestess coughs into her fist, looking a little apologetic.  
  
'You have been with us for eight days. This is the first time you are fully conscious'.  
  
She jolts upright in her bed. _Eight days?!_ Curse it all! She has never, ever wasted entire chunks of her life like that!  
  
Dinya picks at the sleeve of her robes with her fingers, clearly frightened by her patient's silent anger.  
  
'You had a very bad case of untreated bonebreak fever, which only the strongest potions and magic were able to break. In...' she falters a little, but then decides to go on. 'In fact, your condition was so terrible that at first Maramal was hesitant about even trying to treat you. But the mer that brought you here was very... persuasive'.  
  
'The mer that brought me here?'  
  
Now that is an interesting development. So someone found her, out there in the wilderness, and took her to the priests to be healed... Could it be...? But no, that would be too storybook, too cliché... Though he did say that modern bards let good stories wither because they worry too much about clichés...  
  
Dinya nods enthusiastically.  
  
'An Altmer, middle-aged... more or less... Tall forehead, thick hair, knotted beard. He did not tell us his name, or his, umm,' the priestess blushes, 'His relation to you - there was simply no time for that. He never left your bedside until now; said he was called away on business and would be at the Bee and Barb if we need him. He has been most helpful...' Dinya's eyes grow dim and dreamy, 'Ah, the way he took care of you... the way he stubbornly believed that you would win the fight for your life, even though we told him your chances were slim... the way he kissed you on the forehead every time you stopped thrashing and fell into peaceful sleep... It was so beautiful; one could see the light of Mother Mara shining in his eyes...'  
  
The priestess rambles on and on, but she has better things to do than listen to all that pious rubbish. Unbelievable! Simply unbelievable! The cliché has worked! What she hoped for, in her heart of hearts, and hurried to dismiss as a foolish fancy, has turned out to be true! He is here, in Riften; he has saved her life; he has spent eight days watching her get over her fever! She will have to beat her memory into resurrecting those eight days - she must remember everything, every fracture of a second, every glance, every sigh, every whisper... every kiss.   
  
Laughing insanely, tripping over the hem of her robe, she rushes out of the Temple and sweeps, hurricane-like, through the deserted morning streets towards the inn. Dinya squeaks something in agitation behind her back, but her voice is barely audible through the deafening, triumphant drum beat that rings through her escaped patient's body, entrancing her, guiding her bare feet over the glistening cobblestones - it must have rained heavily during the night - pushing her forward, ever forward, past the yawning, bewildered passersby, across the canal, through the tavern doors...  
  
'Illa? By the Eight, what are you doing out of bed?! You are still sick!'  
  
She almost screams when she hears his voice. _By Azura, by Azura, by Azura!_ (Good thing her grandfather's ghost hasn't manifested himself - this phrase irks him for some reason). There he is - her Vivi, her lion-maned bard, her gentle, protective, passionate husband... Yes, her husband; scratch the 'former' part - at least, for now. For now, she wants to forget about the past and focus on the present - to make sure that he is real, and not some lingering side effect of her delirium.  
  
As she stifles his anxious pleas to stop over-exerting herself, as she digs her fingers into his back and forces her tongue into his mouth, she is pierced by the familiar surge of excitement - the heavenly, breathtaking thrill that she missed so much and, like an addict driven to desperation by withdrawal, searched in vain in the arms of other men. Even though her eyes are closed, she feels as though swimming in a sea of warm, tingling light; she tightens her grip, her body screaming for more. More, more - till she starts thinking that might as well die right now, because it is so utterly perfect...  
  
  
'You there, High Elf!'  
  
With an almost audible sizzle, the golden light goes out; the kiss is interrupted by the bald, wild-bearded, red-faced head of the Snow-Shod clan; he approaches them, swaying and hiccupping, coated in swirling waves of liquor odor like a mage casting a cloak spell. Amazing, just amazing, how someone can get so drunk so early. One of the great feats of the sons of Skyrim, presumably.  
  
'I heard you swear by the Eight; one of those faith... faithless Imperial supporters, are you? A Tha... Thaleemor spy, I bet - all your kind are Tha... Tha... spies! Well, tell you what,' he stands on tiptoe and shakes a quivering finger in their faces, 'This is a Stormcloak city, you treacherous scum! And no true Nord will allow you to go about spreading your stench, and standing in... in public licking your filthy grey-skin sl...'  
  
She smiles as her precious Vivi draws himself up to his full height, casting a menacing shadow over the old man, and says, his voice loud and sharp,   
  
'Take back what you said about her, human. _Now.'_  
  
There are so very, very few things on the gods' green Nirn that are as sweet as an angry Altmer...  
  
The old Nord spits on the floor.  
  
'I'm not taking it back. We do not take back the truth'.  
  
She starts, her heart jolting painfully. For the old man's insult - not the one directed at Vi, obviously - is the truth.  
  
Breathing heavily through his nose, Vi slips out of her embrace and grabs old Snow-Shod by the front of his richly embroidered, fur-adorned coat. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see Keerava stiffen behind her counter - a tavern brawl is not the best way to start a day, for sure... Although what follows is too short to be called a brawl. The veins on Vi's neck swell and, with a force that belongs straight to one of the songs he teaches his students, he tosses Snow-Shod on top of a nearby table. After hovering over him for a few seconds, glaring into his unblinking, bloodshot eyes, he steps away from the old man and says slowly,  
  
'I am a peaceful mer; I wield a quill, not a sword. But if you ever say a crass word about my wife again - I won't care how rich and well-connected you may be; I will end your tale in a way that we will both regret'.  
  
And, without waiting for the Nord to come to his senses, he weaves his arm through hers and leads her towards the door.  
  
'You need to get back to the Temple'.  
  
As they walk away from the inn, side by side, she looks up at him and asks softly,  
  
'What happened to your hand?'  
  
While he was holding Snow-Shod by the throat, she noticed that his knuckles were swollen, bruised and scabby; she is now stroking them gently with the soft pads of her fingers.  
  
He lets out an uncomfortable cough.  
  
'I, uh... might have... punched the Temple wall a few times. After hearing you... talk in your sleep. So... many... male names...'  
  
She stops, closes her eyes and holds her breath. Of course. Nothing good lasts forever. After the inebriating joy of their meeting, there was bound to be a hangover. What was she thinking, seeking him out? Kissing him? Didn't she force herself to break up with him, to spare him from the shameful lie that was their marriage? Didn't she elude him every time they crossed paths?  
  
She can feel his fingers cupping round her chin; she can hear his voice, quiet but firm, and every word that he says sinks into her heart like a spear, making her burn in the agony of guilt.  
  
'Let me tell you something, Illa. You must know that the local inn has no bard; the publican has recently contacted the College to ask if we could recommend a graduate. I came down here to discuss the matter with her - it could have been done by correspondence, of course, but I thought that if I travelled to Riften I might have a chance to... meet you. It seems I cannot survive without those little meetings we keep having...  
  
'I stopped my carriage a little way outside the gates; wanted to take a stroll through that stunningly beautiful birch forest. Landscapes like this are like a drink of the sweetest mead to a bard... Thank the gods I wandered off far enough to find you... I... I still have trouble remembering how I got to the Temple of Mara - all I could focus on was your face, looking up at me as I held you in my arms... I... Let's just say I have not understood the meaning of the word 'fear' until now.  
  
'The eight days at your bedside gave me plenty of time to... reflect. When you first started talking to yourself, about the crimes you had committed, and the men you had been with, I was livid. The priests almost kicked me out - though I did promise to pay them for the broken benches... But then... As I sat there, watching you drown in oblivion and then resurface again - knowing that, at any moment, you might slip away... remembering what you said to me back at Dragontooth Crater, when our roles had been reversed... I... I realized that what matters most is the vow we gave to each other in that very temple. I have stayed true to that vow, and so have you, no matter what you might say or do to deny it. This chase has lasted far too long; no one can stand it when the story lags. I forgive you, Illa. I want you back. You hurt me, it is true; but only you can heal me'.  
  
He leans forward, attempting to kiss her. She turns away. Sweet, sweet Vivi - if only it were that simple... If only they could turn the page and see, 'So they lived happily ever after' written after it...  
  
Her eyes now wide open, stinging with tears, she takes him by the hand and leads him to the wooden railing along the canal. From where they stand, they can see the greenish-brown, greasy, stagnant water, licking the rotting wood and the mossy stones - and somewhere in the dark, untouched by the pale light of the morning sun, the entrance to the Ratway.  
  
'Look closely, Viarmo,' she breathes, lifting her hand out of his. _'This_ is my world now. I can't leave it behind; I am in too deep. I said it before, and I will say it again: you are too good for me. Too noble, too pure. I tried to pretend otherwise once, but no good came out of it... Though... I did lie about not loving you'.  
  
He shakes his head slowly, as if refusing to believe her.  
  
'I am leaving Riften tonight, after sunset,' he says, planting a light, tender kiss on her forehead. 'I will wait at the gates for half an hour. Find me if you change your mind... Now, please return to the Temple; the good priests must have lost their minds over your escape. In the meanwhile, I will go and apologize to Keerava - something tells me that the scene I made won't make the College look good in her eyes'.  
  
  
  
Shortly after sundown, it starts raining again. She stands concealed in the shadows, drinking an invisibility potion every now and again, shivering in the sickly drizzle, and watches. Watches him pace restlessly in front of the carriage, starting at the slightest rustle of the rain dancing over the fallen leaves, and finally climb in and motion to the driver to set off, his shoulders twitching. Watches the carriage dissolve, dream-like, in the wet dark-grey veil, bound for Solitude, for the world where she will never belong again.  
  
  
 _'I am sorry, Viarmo... I cannot change who I am...'_


	7. Chapter 7

Alone. In the dark. Surrounded by nameless horrors waiting to catch him off-guard - yes, yes, he was sure they were there, whispering in the murk, planning, plotting, biding their time; monstrous, disfigured creatures, Falmer the size of giants, insects with bodies like those of well-fed horses, insects with Falmer faces, Falmer with chitin pincers, with twitching, glistening bug legs growing out of their empty eyes...  
  
Alone. In the dark. With the silent emptiness pressing in on him, suffocating him, draining the life out of him, leaving him with barely enough breath for a groan, let alone a scream...  
  
Alone. In the dark. And Illa so still, so silent, her angular elven face a mask of greyish white wax... She was supposed to protect him! To guide him through the ruin! To help him retrieve Grimsever, to prove to Mjoll...  
  
Wait. What exactly was he going to prove to Mjoll? That he was what the Nords called a milk-drinker, a coward, who should not have left the safety of Riften walls? That he was about to give up, to give in, to be broken by his accursed fear? That when his hireling - no, his companion, his friend - was down, he, instead of helping, felt angry with her, like a selfish child?  
  
Aerin jerked his head from left to right and rested his clenched fists on his knees, thinking frantically. He had to do something! He had saved a life once; he could do it again! True, a tiny voice whimpered within him, but he had tended to Mjoll's wounds out in the open air, and then underneath the shelter of his own roof - and this was an underground, cavernous ruin teeming with waking nightmares...  
  
He grabbed at his head, little short of rolling on the floor in desperation - but then froze, eyes widening, his mind echoing with a voice from a distant memory. Mjoll's voice.  
  
Shortly after her wounds closed and she got back on her feet, he had approached her, shyly, drawing curved lines on the ground with the tip of his boot, and asked her to teach him how to handle a blade. She had raised her eyebrows in surprise - the look on his face must have been so pathetic! - but still agreed. He did not last longer than two or three lessons. Too weak, too frightened to hit their dummy with full force. And too ashamed of himself to keep on trying.  
  
What he was remembering now were the words Mjoll had repeated to him several times as he stood, legs wide apart, his sweating palms sliding off the sword hilt, the heavy blade drooping down and scraping the floor.  
  
 _'Look at you, Aerin. You have not even gone into real battle yet, and you are already shaking. You have to stay calm and focused. The whole world may be bursting into flames, but for you, only one thing should exist. Your target. All the rest, any things behind your back that are distracting you, any fear, any hesitation, should be erased from your mind. Calm and focused, Aerin. Calm and focused'._  
  
  
'Calm and focused,' he whispered, swallowing a lump in his throat. 'Calm and focused'.  
  
The world did not exist. There was no cave. There were no monsters. There was nothing at all in an empty, completely empty, blank space; nothing but his target. Illa's wound.   
  
He leaned closer to inspect the mark of the insect's pincers; and just at that moment, Illa's eyebrows twitched. She was grimacing in pain. She was still alive; by the gods, how strong did she have to be to have kept clinging on while he was wallowing in his misery? But he could not keep twiddling his thumbs and testing her limit! He had to save her!   
  
He passed his hand over her wound, chanting monotonously, and soft, honey-coloured light burst out of his fingertips - but as its gentle, tingling rays reached the darkness of wound, they dissolved in it - consumed by it, defeated by it, extinguished... Aerin frowned. Trust his rotten luck! The spell that he knew only mended the flesh; it would be no use as long as the insect's poison was tainting Illa's blood. So all that was left for him to do was sit there and watch her die, useless as always? No; there had to be some way out; he just had to find it! Calm and focused. Calm and focused. Think of nothing but the target... What target, though?..  
  
His glance fell on Illa's backpack, lying limp and abandoned at her side. Of course! She had all sorts of paraphernalia in there - including potions! What if, somewhere in those unfathomable depths, there was a concoction that cured poison?   
  
With a deep intake of breath, like a swimmer preparing for a dive, he thrust his arm inside the pack; it sank up to the elbow, and he thought he could feel a gentle tickle creeping up from his fingers. A spell. So he was right; that thing was enchanted. And quite strongly, to boot. It seemed as though it opened into some black, boundless void that contained all sorts of mismatched objects, mashed together and yet miraculously intact (most of the time). After his first dive, he emerged holding a battered, dog-eared copy of Halgerd's Tale, a roughly cast metal ingot, and what looked like a largish chunk of a dragon's scaly hide. Next, he fished out a sabre cat's fang, a glittering pendant with huge, most likely fake, emeralds, and a faintly glowing parchment scroll, which he hurried to toss on the floor lest it explode in his hands. Then, out came a beautiful, impeccably polished elven helmet, a half-picked calf bone, and a dried bouquet of flowers, with a letter attached to it,  
  
 _'Illari,  
  
I still cannot figure out what a good soul like you is doing in the Thieves Guild - but thank you. On behalf of all of us in the Bunkhouse. Yes, this time you left behind some clues for us to put together; Madesi saw you head to Elgrim's with a heap of alchemy supplies and return with a small bundle - and later, Wujeeta found a red hair stuck to the potion bottle that she miraculously found next to her pillow. And if it was you who helped her, it has to be you that did all those other secret good deeds, right? I wish you would come out into the open, though, - there is no shame in aiding the needy.  
  
And thank you for that wonderful night. You must have put an enchantment on me, for sure - it is all such a blur from when you came up to me as I was leaving work to my finding myself in your house. But even if I was under a spell, I do not regret it. The time with you - and our talk afterwards - has given me more confidence. Now I feel I can stand up to anyone, even Indaryn. Maybe I will even pluck up enough courage to quit the Meadery and leave Riften for good, like I always wanted.   
  
And I completely understand your wish not to go on with this. And not because what you told me about fleeting moments and seizing the day. I do not know if you remember, but I think I should tell you that while you were with me, you were screaming the name, 'Viarmo'. Whoever he is, he is a lucky man.  
  
Thank you once again, and I hope the next time we meet, I won't be reciting that nonsense about Black-Briar mead.  
  
Ungrien'_  
  
  
Aerin really did not mean to pry into Illa's private correspondence - the missive just sort of unfolded in his hands, and by the time he realized it was a memento of one of her amorous escapades, it was already too late. Honest.   
  
Blushing fiercely, he laid the flowers and the letter down carefully on the floor and went on digging. Finally, underneath a layer of the most extraordinary objects (including, but not limited to clusters of glowing purple crystals, various spellbooks and treasure maps, and yet another keepsake - a lock of thick black hair tied with a ribbon, which had a short message hastily dashed down on it in ink, 'Let's spar again sometime. E'), there came the potions. And here, Aerin was in for a bitter disappointment that made his heart sink. They were not labelled. Well, every now and then he did come across a phial wrapped in a slip of parchment with something like, 'Giant's Toe XDD' written on it - but apart from that, all those clanking glass bottles and beakers were completely blank, and as the slurping, bubbling, glowing liquids inside them all looked the same to Aerin, there was no way he could possibly determine which one was the poison cure.  
  
Illa's swollen lips parted in a half-sigh, half-groan; Aerin looked away from her with a shuddering sob. He could not stand the sight of her frozen features, distorted by what must have been agonizing pain; the guilt at letting her down was too much to bear even without this ghastly reminder. Some hero he made... Instead of conquering the mystic depths of the ancient Dwemer fortress and reclaiming Mjoll's sword, he would have to return to Riften empty-handed, humiliated, with the blood of his hireling on his hands. That is, if he even made it all the way back. If he did not get lost in those endless, maze-like passages, and perish... Alone. In the dark.   
  
'The poison antidote is in the small blue bottle, the one with dried moss stuck to it'.  
  
Aerin had never realized that his throat was capable of producing such shrill, high-pitched sounds. If there were any Falmer stragglers in the vicinity, they must have died a horrible death when his scream tore at their ears, which had to be overly sensitive since the creatures were blind. To his utmost horror, the thoughts that had slid idly through his mind when he and Illa had just come down here on the elevator - the thoughts about campfire stories, and spectres on the hunt...  those thoughts were materializing. Hovering over him, his arms folded on his chest, his face twisted into an irritated scowl, there was a real - terrifyingly real - ghost. An elf - a Dunmer, for his eyes were burning a bright, scorching red against the whitish blue of his face. Clad in a set of rather clumsy, old-fashioned armour - iron, perhaps, though it was hard to tell, it being all blue and glowing. Covered in battle scars, the broadest crossing his neck (with a small gulp, Aerin guessed that the Dunmer must have died a violent death). And thoroughly intimidating from head, crowned by a tall silvery mohawk, to toe - or at least, to the place where his legs faded away into thin air.  
  
He had suffered through Aerin's scream with his lips curled in disgust; when, at long last, the living human ran out of breath, the Dunmer ghost spat out,  
  
'Shut your slobbering mouth and do as I tell you! I can sense my granddaughter drawing further from you and closer to me - all because of your incompetence!'  
  
Aerin lowered his eyes, blushing like a scolded child, and rattled through the pack obediently, in search of the small, moss-adorned blue bottle.  
  
'You... You are Illa's guardian, aren't you?' he asked shakily, forcing himself to focus on the potion phials.  
  
'Her name is Illari,' the ghost replied stiffly. 'I have never approved of that name-shortening nonsense; stupid human custom. The girl has no respect for the heritage of her ancestors... And those insinuations about ghostly warrior princesses were a filthy lie!' he added suddenly, as if in protest - even though Aerin would never have dreamt to bring up that particular remark of Illa's. 'I have not met my wife in the afterlife - but I remain faithful to her, unlike some shameless little...'  
  
'Found it!' once again, the conversation was getting uncomfortable, and Aerin was more than happy to welcome a chance to change the subject.   
  
His hands trembling uncontrollably, he grasped at the tiny blue phial, the dry moss pressing into his skin, and, with a loud clang against Illa's teeth, stuffed its neck into her mouth. The ghost's fierce glare bored into his back, making him sweat, and turning his arms into limp, useless chunks of flesh, too weak even to lift Illa's head and make her swallow. It took him several tries, but finally, he managed to get the potion down her throat. Her eyelids fluttered, exposing slits of blank red, and she whispered, her lips barely moving,  
  
 _'I am sorry, Viarmo... I cannot change who I am...'_  
  
Aerin gaped at her, startled - but the ghost did not allow him to linger.   
  
'The cure is working! Thank the gods those potions take effect so fast! Now, start casting that spell of yours again! Don't gawk around, just do it!'  
  
'You... You were watching me?' Aerin asked as he let the light of restorative magic swell up in his palm again.  
  
The ghost snorted.  
  
'You think too highly of yourself. I was not watching you; I was watching Illari. As I do all the time. Unseen, save for emergencies like this one'.  
  
'Why?' It must have sounded awfully childish, but Aerin could not help himself. Thinking, with a pang of apprehension, that the ghost might have been offended by his question, he hurried to add the address that he'd heard from the Dunmer living in Riften, 'Se... Sera?'  
  
The red flame in the spectre's eyes grew dimmer; he seemed to have acknowledged Aerin's politeness.  
  
'She is the last member of my bloodline; it is my duty to protect her. Though she does not make my job any easier, the little daredremora...'  
  
Aerin hurried to pore over Illa's wound to conceal a smile - despite the ghost's displeased air, he had detected an unmistakable tone of fondness in his voice.  
  
For a while, neither of them spoke any more; the silence was broken only by the gentle chime of Aerin's spell. But when he stopped to wait for his magical energy to replenish, the ghost instantly lashed out at him,  
  
'What is the meaning of this, human?! Keep casting!'  
  
'I can't,' Aerin whimpered defensively, shrinking his head into his shoulders as the ghost drew his enraged face close to his. 'I am out of magicka...'  
  
'Excuses!' the ghost roared, his eyes flaring brighter than ever. 'Goddamn excuses! You miserable n'wah have the power to bring my little girl back, and... You! Will! Use! It!'  
  
  
'Did... Did you just call me your little girl? Is it free-Skooma-giveaway day at Azura's?'  
  
Illa was still barely able to keep her eyes open, and her voice was little louder than a sigh - but the attempt at mockery made an immense weight roll off Aerin's shoulders. He did it.  
  
The ghost pursed his lips.  
  
'I called you nothing of the sort. I was just urging your worthless human friend here to do his job'.  
  
'He is not worthless,' Illa whispered, frowning. 'Starting from today'.  
  
Then, straining herself to speak as loudly as she could, she added,  
  
'Aerin, if you'll be a sweetie and give me a handful of healing potions - they are the dark-pink ones. A sip of those will make me strong enough to bandage myself... Save you the shock of taking my armour off'.   
  
  
  
If, some time later, a daring explorer had wandered into the abandoned halls of the ruin's lower level, he would have beheld a most curious sight: a Dunmer woman sitting wrapped in a blanket and a few animal pelts, with her back propped up against a pile of stone rubble, sipping a casual potion flask; a young Imperial man fussing over her, rearranging her covers and handing her whatever it was her whim to ask him; and another Dunmer, a ghost, gliding round the two of them, apparently on the lookout for any danger, casting a disapproving glance at the woman every time she spoke. Not your typical adventurer campsite, to be sure.  
  
  
'You make such a sweet nurse, Aerin,' Illa said, stretching herself languidly. The combined force of Aerin's magic and a few healing mixtures of her own was doing wonders; she seemed to be gaining strength by the second. 'Did you give Mjoll half as much attention? Good thing she does not see this; I have more than enough jealous wives in my life'.  
  
It required great skill to discern coherent words in the spluttering, sneeze-like sound Aerin made.  
  
'Mjoll... she... I... she's not...'  
  
Illa smirked,  
  
'All right, all right - future wives, too. Though I do think it goes to my credit that I try to steer clear of men who are in stable relationships... Ah, fine. I will stop embarrassing you. Perhaps we should get a move on? I do feel I'm ready to get back on my feet again. Talk about timely healing! Last time I was in a fix like this, I had two priests fight for my life for more than a week - all because I didn't drink a potion when I should have... I owe you, Aerin; big time'.  
  
He rubbed the back of his neck, smiling a flustered smile.  
  
'Actually, it was kind of your grandfather... He helped me cure you from poison. I think...'  
  
Was it some supernatural power of premonition, granted to spirits? Had the ghost guessed that Aerin was going to say he thought he really cared for Illa but was just bent on hiding it? In any case, that was precisely the moment when the cranky ancestor guardian slid up to them and snapped at his wayward granddaughter,  
  
'You _are_ ready to get back on your feet - so don't just lie around! I took less time to rest after your grandmother healed me - from much worse wounds, I might add! There was one time when we were inside an Oblivion gate...'  
  
'I get it, I get it,' Illa cut him short in exasperation, standing up and cracking her back. 'You two were real tough guys, and I will have to tie myself into knots to become half the warrior either of you was... See, I am up - no need for lectures!'  
  
'No need indeed,' the ghost groused, sounding offended - and vanished in a whirl of blue smoke.  
  
'It's about time,' Illa muttered. 'Well, let's get the show on the road again!'  
  
Aerin nodded in silence, too overwhelmed by the sudden realization that he was not going to meet his end alone in the dark, after all, to squeeze out as much as a syllable.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song that Illa and Aerin are singing on their way to Morthal is The Gambler by Kenny Rogers, which I paraphrased a little to give it a more TES-like flair, substituting train for silt strider, whiskey for mazte, and cigarette for pipe tobacco... because I don't think they smoke cigarettes in Tamriel.

'Well, I'll be Ulfric Stormcloak's doormat - looks like we made it!'  
  
Aerin trotted up to Illa, who was standing, her slender figure outlined inky black, on the threshold of a small chamber, which was still brightly lit by some cunning ancient Dwemer technology... and froze, his face splitting into the broadest, stupidest grin in history. Lying on a square stone ledge - perhaps a Dwarven shelf, or a table - in the shadow of some sort of enormous metal statue, there was a broad-bladed, glimmering glass sword. Grimsever. By the gods, was it really true?! He had reached his goal; there would be no more savage bandits, no more skulking eyeless creatures, no more oversized bugs, no more frightening Dwemer killing machines... All he had to do was step forward and claim his prize.  
  
'Aerin, wait! You'll wake the...'  
  
The rest of Illa's frantic cry was drowned out by loud ticking and clanking and grinding. His blood freezing to an icy crust like the streams of Skyrim in wintertime, Aerin leapt back to the chamber's entrance. He recognized the sound - the wakening yawn of Dwemer machinery. As soon as he crossed the threshold, the metal statue had sprung to life.  
  
It was so stupid, the impulse that made him backtrack and cower next to Illa. Foolishly, irrationally, desperately, like a child that loses in a game and takes another try, he hoped, in his heart of hearts, that if he retraced his steps, if he went back to the entrance, time would go back with him, and the towering construct he had roused would wind down again... Of course, that was never going to happen. The living statue took a broad stride towards them, its head almost scraping the ceiling, and lifted its enormous, log-thick arms - with a tiny stifled whimper, Aerin noticed that, like the sphere warrior, this automaton had razor-sharp, gleaming weapons attached to it below the elbows. Any second now, it would be bringing all those spikes and hammers - and was that a saw? - down on their heads, crushing them like tiny, helpless bugs...  
  
Swift like a shadow of a cloud on the grass, Illa dashed past the construct towards the stone ledge and grabbed Grimsever. Slowly, clumsily, its limbs creaking after an age-long sleep, the hulking monstrosity turned to face her, and with a deafening whistle, let out a thick jet of steam. It must have been hot, for Illa cried out when its milky swirls licked her skin; but, disregarding the pain, she advanced at the metal colossus, Grimsever in one hand and a humming orb of purplish lightning in the other.  
  
'Make it to that door back there while the thing's distracted!' Illa screamed over the hissing of the steam and the grinding of the construct's joints, moving from side to side on springy, half-bent legs, and dodging the heavy swings of the giant hammer, and the spike - and yes, that was definitely a saw. 'I'll be right behind you!'  
  
With a self-assuring breath of air, Aerin glared fiercely at the metal door at the back of the room. Calm and focused. Calm and focused. Reach the target.   
  
Those few feet of racing to the door behind the colossus' back were like a jump across a precipice. He actually swayed when he felt the door's cold metal beneath his fingers. A single push - and he was out. Out in the open air.  
  
After the dusty, stuffy ruin, the fresh breath of the snowy hills, sparkling diamond-like beneath the pale, frost-touched sky, was like a mouthful of wine. Sobbing happily, his eyeballs pulsing in the blinding daylight, Aerin staggered forward - and moaned in pain as his forehead met a solid metal bar. His way was blocked by tall, spiky railing.   
  
The sun, the snow, the jagged rocks cloaked in glittering frost dust - everything circled away from him, as though dancing one of those slow, sensual Daggerfall dances that he had read of in books and sometimes daydreamed about, Mjoll always being a part of the daydream... He was trapped; this was the end. Soon, the terrible colossus would tear through the door, crumbling it like a sheet of paper, and trample on his skull...  
  
'You do realize there's a lever, right? '  
  
He gave Illa a dazed, blank look. Sweet Mara, that Dunmer was indestructible. Any normal person - and by normal person, he meant mostly himself - would have perished for sure after a confrontation with that mountain of metal... And yet, here she was. With an ugly bloated burn mark across her left cheek, but otherwise, right as rain. Grinning from ear to ear and brandishing Grimsever triumphantly in Aerin's face.  
  
'You'd better hold on to this baby,' she handed the blade to Aerin and pulled at the lever - which indeed was there, right under his nose - making the metal bars retract. 'It is your quest, after all - wouldn't want you to feel anticlimactic, now would we?'  
  
Though lighter than the simple, much cruder, blades that he had had a chance to hold in his hands, Grimsever still pulled his arm down; but no matter how much his strained muscles might ache, Aerin would never dream of letting go. This sword had been Mjoll's faithful companion for years, saving her life many a time; she had given it a name and, as she would often tell Aerin, sighing over the loss of her blade, cherished it beyond all the treasures she had ever come across on her adventures. In a way, Grimsever was part of her, and touching it was... almost like touching Mjoll.  
  
'Come on, snap out of it!' Illa prodded Aerin in the back and he stumbled forward, past the lowered railing. 'I zapped the centurion a few times, but it will be coming to at any moment! We have to get away, fast!'  
  
Still speaking, she started casting a spell - by the greenish light that wove out of her palm, Aerin recognized it as the same magic she had used to bypass the puzzle with the valve. Like the tendrils of some spectral plant, the green rays twisted round the lever; Illa jerked her hand up and then down again, and at her command, the Dwemer switch screeched into its initial position and the metal bars shot up again. Just in time, too - for the colossus was already hammering at the door; Aerin could see the metal bulging outwards where the construct's monstrous limbs hit it.  
  
'The bars won't hold it back for long!' Illa said, tugging at Aerin's arm. 'You'll have to repeat your wolf performance!'  
  
  
She did not have to ask him twice. Eyes rounded in terror, Grimsever - which he had stuffed beneath some strap on his armour - clanging loudly against his leg, he raced among snow-capped cliffs, his every sinew crackling with effort till his lungs drowned in pulsing fire and blood started trickling down his throat. For an excruciating eternity, his mind was completely blank. Just like when the wolves chased him, he did not dare think, did not dare look back, entrusting his life to his legs... Till the snow, which had been more or less trampled up round the ruin by Maluril's crew, started getting thicker, and every step became a struggle with its firm, icy clutches. Huffing, coughing up thick white vapour, he stumbled to a halt - and for the first time, dared to glance over his shoulder. And let out a sharp, anxious cry.  
  
Illa, whose breath he could hear at his side when he just started running, had fallen back. She was crouching in the snow, clutching her stomach; as Aerin waddled closer, he saw a blood spot spreading across her armour beneath her fingertips like a dark-red blossom. The effort of running must have reopened her wound... And looming behind her, drawing ever closer, was the metal giant.  
  
'What... are you doing?' Illa asked hoarsely, looking up at Aerin and casting a healing spell on herself. Somewhat weaker than Aerin's magic, it did not seem to do her much good.   
  
'Go! You have Grimsever; you don't need me anymore!'  
  
'But _you_ need me,' Aerin said firmly, squatting close to her and helping her with the spell.  
  
Those words had sounded frightfully heroic when he uttered them - but a few seconds later, they completely lost their flair. The centurion, or whatever it was called, had caught up with them.  
  
The blow of the colossal hammer sent Aerin flying across the snowdrifts like a ball in one of those games they play in the Colovian Highlands. Everything suddenly turned pitch black - and very cold and wet. The darkness dissolved after a while, as it always did - but the chill and the damp remained. Aerin turned over several times, spitting out what seemed like several mouthfuls of snow; it could have been just his eyes playing tricks, but for a moment, it seemed to him that the snow was tinted red. It took him a while to get his bearings; he was lying in the middle of the great wide white open, with no signs of Illa or the centurion nearby... Although... Yes, he did hear metallic clanking. Wincing as his body refused to obey him, he propped himself up on his elbows and looked around. And just as he did, along came Illa.  
  
Digging deep gulleys in the snow with her many-strapped leather boots, she rushed past him, the centurion hot on her heels, bursts of piping hot steam melting the icy ground beneath its enormous feet. Aerin shrank in fear, but neither Illa nor the construct seemed to take notice of him. The Dunmer circled tirelessly round the jutting rocks, healing herself every now and again, sliding aside every time the centurion aimed a blow at her, and leading it ever uphill. Soon, it became impossible for Aerin to make out what was going on from where he lay, so he pushed himself to his wobbling feet and limped along the tracks in the snow, using Grimsever instead of a crutch (for which he begged Mjoll's forgiveness, multiple times, in a faint whisper).  
  
When he finally caught sight of them again, Illa and the centurion were standing face to face on top of a tall cliff, overlooking several smaller sharp rocks, which rather resembled a mouthful of bad teeth. The Dunmer was rocking on her heels with her back turned towards the steep drop, her hands on her hips, as though daring the centurion to come and get her. The construct did not seem to have handled that chase through the snow very well - Aerin saw it sway slightly on one spot, emitting small wisps of steam, and arched his eyebrows, praying to the gods that the blasted thing would fall apart of its own accord... But, as it often happens, the Divines had other plans.   
  
Hissing and clattering, the centurion stepped towards Illa, the gigantic saw flashing in the pale sunlight. Aerin clapped his hands against his eyes, unable to watch - but through the gap between his fingers, he thought he could see Illa smile.  
  
Just as he was bracing himself for an abrupt downswing and a fountain of blood, something utterly incredible happened. Still smirking, Illa spoke a short word in a language he did not know - and as she did, her whole body became transparent, greyish-blue... spectral, like the form in which her grandfather had manifested himself. Aerin gasped in awe at yet another type of unfamiliar magic his hireling had mastered - but the centurion was unimpressed. It kept advancing at Illa, saw on the ready. When the distance between them grew so short that Aerin began to pant in agitation, the Dunmer raised her hand, made a rude gesture right into the centurion's mask-like face... and took a broad step back, off the cliff.  
  
Aerin shrieked, tearing at his hair... Though not as cosmically scoped as his scream at seeing Illa's ancestor guardian, this sound was still loud enough to attract any foe's attention... but the colossus seemed bent on finishing Illa off first. It followed her, rushing through the air down the sheer drop - and then crashing against the tooth-like rocks below with an unearthly clamour.  
  
Clutching his heart, blinded by tears, Aerin dragged himself up the cliff and looked down... and swore out loud, for the first time in his life. Once again, Illa had emerged safe and sound. Somehow, in some deviously cunning way, she had landed on the rocks without a scratch... and was now sitting among the centurion's remains, saddling its leg, which was sticking out of the metal heap at an odd angle, and swinging on it, up and down, up and down, like a child on a seesaw... Waving at Aerin.  
  
'Yo!' she called out, chuckling at his flabbergasted expression. 'I need some help down here! Gotta pry out this big brute's dynamo core - these things are worth plenty of coin!'  
  
Of course, Aerin took the longer route to get to Illa. Back down the cliff and around it. That leap was clearly one of the tricks you were not supposed to repeat at home.  
  
  
  
'How did you do it?' Aerin asked, with boyish excitement, as he helped Illa yank a round mechanic thingamabob, made out of a few metal rings and some kind of red gemstone, out of the centurion's chest. 'Jump off the cliff like that?'  
  
'Secret of the trade,' she replied, winking at him. 'The things you learn while adventuring... Ah, and out it comes!' having finally gotten her hands on the core, she nestled it cozily in the void that was her backpack. 'Now we can head back to Morthal. I need a warm bath and a good drink... I can share with you, too - the drink, of course, not the bath'.  
  
  
  
The snowy marshes flashed by as though Aerin was flying. When it finally dawned on him that the last danger of the ancient ruin was gone for good, and that Grimsever was his, really his - he cupped his fingers round the top of his throbbing head, fearing that he would go mad with joy. Soon, very soon, it would come - that moment of triumph he had pictured when he first made his resolution to retrieve Mjoll's sword. The people of Riften would behold the new Aerin, brave and adventurous and favoured by the Divines - Grimsever's rescuer, returning from a successful mission, veiled in an aura of glory (and generous enough to let the smallfolk that had once mocked him bask in that aura's golden light)... True, there was the matter of Illa doing most of the job for him - but at the moment, it seemed like such a small technicality...  
  
'Illa...' he said breathlessly, with a slow, elated smile, 'Do you know any songs?'  
  
Was that a shadow darkening her face? No, it couldn't be! How could anyone be upset by anything when he was so happy?  
  
'I did once,' she replied, sounding rather stiff, 'Learned quite a few from the bards when I was... living in Solitude. But most of the words have slipped my mind by now...'  
  
'That's too bad,' Aerin sighed.  
  
He himself had trouble remembering any song at all - but the feeling refused to go away... that gleeful tickle at the back of his throat, demanding him to sing something, anything, to let out some of the joy swelling up within his heart - lest it burst.  
  
  
'Although... There is this one little ballad thing,' Illa added suddenly. 'My uncle would hum it all the time round the house before he left the Grey Quarter... I didn't get what it was about, but it stuck in my memory. And then, when I finally figured out what it meant, I taught it to my guildmates... We sing it round the Ragged Flagon now and again. You,' she let out a small snort, 'You wouldn't like it'.  
  
He was quite sure he wouldn't. A Thieves Guild ditty? It had to be disgusting, obnoxious, rude at the very least! But the tickle in his throat was so persistent - he had to burst into song right now!  
  
'It's all right,' he said, still smiling. 'As long as it's singable. Come on, you start, I'll join the chorus'.  
  
'All right... Don't say that I didn't warn you!'  
  
Illa cleared her throat, squinted her eyes and began, rather out of tune, but with evident feeling that made her deep, velvety voice tremble a little,  
  
 _'On a warm summer's evenin' on a stider bound for nowhere,  
I met up with the gambler; we were both too tired to sleep.  
So we took turns a starin' off the strider at the darkness  
'Til boredom overtook us, and he began to speak.  
  
He said, 'Sera, I've made my life out of readin' people's faces,  
And knowin' what their cards were by the way they held their eyes.  
So if you don't mind my sayin', I can see you're out of aces.  
For a taste of your mazte I'll give you some advice...'_  
  
Here she stopped to glance at Aerin - perhaps to see if he was repelled by all that mentioning of gamblers and suspicious Dunmer drinks. And he sure was repelled - but, unable to fight the joyous tickle, he had started humming when Illa began the second verse, attempting to pick up the tune. Taking in his expression with a small smirk, Illa went on,  
  
 _'So I handed him my bottle and he drank down my last swallow.  
Then he took out some tobacco and asked me for a light.  
And the night got deathly quiet, and his face lost all expression.  
Said, 'If you're gonna play the game, friend, ya gotta learn to play it right...'_  
  
Jerking her head from side to side, Illa snapped her fingers and, her eyes now completely closed, began the chorus,  
  
 _'You got to know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em,  
Know when to walk away and know when to run.  
You never count your money when you're sittin' at the table.  
There'll be time enough for countin' when the dealin's done...'_  
  
The tune danced inside Aerin's mind, making the tickle grow stronger and stronger, till finally, when Illa caught her breath and started the chorus lines over, he joined in, loudly, shrilly, letting his eyelids slide shut like his Dunmer companion's and allowing the throbbing rhythm to sweep him off and carry him down the path back to Morthal.  
  
They sang the rest of the song together, Illa letting Aerin memorize each line and then repeating it with him, their voices reaching out to the cold, distant skies. It was not a cheerful song, to be sure, not too suited for Aerin's ecstatic mood... But all the same, he greatly enjoyed this - dancing along the road with Illa, screaming his lungs off when he reached the most emphatic parts of the verse, listening to the marshes ring with the echo of his voice... And, quite in spite of himself, by the end of the song he came to appreciating the lyrics as well.  
  
 _'Now ev'ry gambler knows that the secret to survivin'_  
Is knowin' what to throw away and knowing what to keep.  
'Cause ev'ry hand's a winner and ev'ry hand's a loser,  
And the best that you can hope for is to die in your sleep.'  
  
So when he'd finished speakin', he turned his back towards me,  
Crushed out his tobacco and faded off to sleep.  
And somewhere in the darkness the gambler, he broke even.  
But in his final words I found an ace that I could keep.  
  
You got to know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em,  
Know when to walk away and know when to run.  
You never count your money when you're sittin' at the table.  
There'll be time enough for countin' when the dealin's done.  
  
Their loud, decisive 'done' leapt up to the frozen roof of the heavens and bounced back from it like a ball, rolling through the snow and finally fading away into silence - when they stepped onto the wooden walkway over the slurping icy slush that lapped against the bank on the outskirts of Morthal.  
  
From where they stood, they could make out a small group of people gathered at the steps of Highmoon Hall, waving their arms in the air and shouting something.  
  
Illa whistled softly,  
  
'Looks like the nay-sayers are at it again... Poor old Idgrod has her work cut out for her...'  
  
'You know the Jarl?' Aerin asked. 'I mean, personally?' And here he was thinking that his hireling's stock of surprises had run out.  
  
'Of course!' Though, as she often did, Illa spoke half in jest, her tone was far from disrespectful. 'The old biddy does not give a skeever's butt what people think - if she wants to invite a filthy little thief to dinner, she darn well invites a filthy little thief to dinner, and does not even think of counting the silver forks! And have you seen her man? Dayum, the lady's got guts! When she made me Thane, I was closer to feeling honoured than with any other Jarl... You know what...' Illa frowned slightly, 'I'd better go check this out; who knows what those superstitious pink-faced bumpkins have gotten into their heads this time... On second thought...' She delved into her backpack and produced a small, milky-white phial.  'Make it check this out discreetly; the locals have no love for little old me. Thought I was in league with that vampiress - pshaw! There's a difference between seducing men and turning them into your thralls!'  
  
With those words, she took a quick gulp out of the phial - and, to Aerin's renewed amazement, melted away into a faint ripple in the still wintry air.  
  
'An... invisibility potion?' Aerin asked breathlessly. 'Why... Why didn't you let us use it back in the ruin?'   
  
'Because this is my last bottle, and there would've been no point wasting it,' she replied calmly, her voice moving away from him. 'I drink these only in broad daylight; back in the ruin, we were dealing with bandits that couldn't see us in the dark, and with blind Falmer. Besides, aren't you sick and tired of being invisible?'  
  
Leaving Aerin with this food for thought, she crept off towards the Jarl's loghouse.


	9. Chapter 9

Mjoll had known that Dunmer rogue was bad news from the moment she set eyes on her as the cheeky little wanton was entering Riften for the first time. The way she ran her fingers up the front of the guardsman's armour, narrowing her eyes and half-parting her lips, making him forget all about the preposterous entrance toll he was demanding and rush to open the gate for her. The way she hit it off instantly with Maul, Maven Black-Briar's chief troubleshooter, smiling at him and listening attentively to all he had to say about the scum from the Ratway. The way she looked into Mjoll's eyes as, bold as brass, she responded to her friendly 'What brings you to Riften?' saying that she was looking to join the Thieves Guild. Accursed grey-skinned street rat. The likes of her belonged in prison - or better still, in a hangman's hose - not out in the street. Robbing honest men and women blind. And breaking up their marriages - Mjoll had heard tell that she was trying to drive a wedge between Bolli and Nivenor... True, there was also word in the street that the newest thief of the guild spared the poorest; that she actually helped some of them, returning an ancestral heirloom to the Llaniths, saving Marise Aravel's trade by getting her ice wraith teeth just as her meat was beginning to spoil, curing Wujeeta's Skooma withdrawal... But Mjoll refused to believe it. The famous Grey Fox, the thief from the Imperial province that stole from the rich and gave to the poor, was long-gone; the memory of him had faded into a vague legend, and even the old song about him and what he said had been twisted into nonsensical gibberish. There was no honour among thieves.   
  
The Dunmer rogue came and went, darting in and out of Riften like the shuttle of a weaver's loom - but every time she came into town, Mjoll kept a close eye on her. She must have sensed, in her heart of hearts, that the little rat was about to do something horrible. To commit a crime that would make theft and adultery pale in comparison. But she could not have known, she could not have foreseen, that the ash-born scum would do what she had done. That she would stoop so low.   
  
Kidnapping Aerin... Poor, sweet, kind, innocent Aerin... Gods, Mjoll still could not wrap her head round this. When she came home after her usual peace-keeping rounds, exhausted and longing to see Aerin's face, to hear his gentle voice welcoming her to sit and rest - and found nothing but emptiness... her heart stopped. She knew Aerin's habits; he always stayed at home to wait for her - so if he was not there, something had to be terribly, terribly wrong. With a roar of pain and anger that proved her nickname's accuracy, she burst out into the sunset-golden street, calling Aerin's name till her throat felt as if there were thorns sinking into it. She questioned every passerby, every merchant at the market; it pained her to see them back away from her in fear - but she could not control herself. Like a lioness raging over the loss of her cub. No; that would not have been entirely accurate... She knew it had to seem to Aerin that she was treating him like a child - but it was not true. She was just trying to protect him, to repay the debt she owed him for saving her life and allowing her, a homeless adventurer with neither kith nor kin, to stay with him in Riften. He was a dear friend; and at times, she wished... But how did one go about these things? Was she supposed to just linger with him at the supper table and say, instead of wishing him goodnight, 'I love you, Aerin'?..  
  
Finally, Edda the beggar - who Mjoll would later have to apologize to for almost strangling her in an attempt to get out a coherent answer - recollected seeing Aerin in a back alley, in the company of that hateful little Dunmer... It did not take long for Mjoll to put two and two together. She had kidnapped him. Her precious, darling Aerin. Mother Mara, he must have been so frightened, swept off into nowhere by that conniving Dark Elf... It was all her fault. She should have let him come with her. He would have been safe by her side. She would have shielded him from harm...  
  
There was no ransom note; Mjoll double-checked this when she rushed back home. Perhaps the Thieves Guild had decided to send her a message - or they were just biding their time. Well, she was not about to grant them that luxury. Ugh, those filthy cowards! They did not dare take on the Champion of Riften in the open - so they had to prey on the helpless... Endangering her poor little lamb...  
  
A second round of questioning - once again, she owed Edda an apology - revealed that Aerin and the Dunmer had headed to the stables. She was taking him away; planning to hold him hostage in some remote spot... Without food and water, most likely; chained to the wall in some damp, dark dungeon. Oh by Shor, Aerin was afraid of the dark! She could not let him suffer; she had to find him as soon as possible!  
  
Unstoppable, relentless like a tidal wave, Mjoll swept down the street and through the gates - but when she reached the stables, she crushed - figuratively, of course - against an infuriatingly solid rock. Hofgrir stubbornly insisted that he had not seen either the Dunmer or Aerin; that if he had, he would have told Mjoll, upon his word - and why in blazes didn't she leave him alone? He had horses to tend to!  
  
Mjoll would have left the stables and hit the wilderness, stumbling blindly through birch grove after silent birch grove, crying for Aerin... but something stopped her. Throughout their entire conversation, the stable master had been evading her gaze, looking anywhere: at the floor, at his large, coarse, grimy hands, at the lucky horseshoe hanging over the entrance to his humble hut - but not into Mjoll's eyes. Finally, after he tried to shoo her off for what must have been a hundredth time, she laid her hand heavily on his shoulder, forcing him to look at her, and said,  
  
'You are lying, aren't you?'  
  
Hofgrir's face grew the colour of fresh beetroot soup.  
  
'Fine!' he muttered through his teeth, his forehead beginning to glisten with sweat. 'Thank the gods Shadr is off running errands; wouldn't want the boy to hear this. You see...' he cleared his throat uncomfortably. 'That Dunmer and me, we hook up now and again... She is mighty fine - though kind of sad sometimes; as though men are for her what mead is for most folks. You know, trying to forget. Anyway, she is leagues better than Haelga because...'  
  
Mjoll's eyebrows moulded together into one straight, highly disapproving line; Hofgrir swallowed loudly and hurried to conclude,  
  
'Well, Haelga is furious about all of this, of course. Last time I saw her, she threatened to scratch my eyes out; said Riften was her hunting ground and hers alone or some such rubbish. That's  why I didn't want to tell you... I was just afraid that if she got wind that the little rogue was passing by the stables again...'  
  
'Where did the Dark Elf go from here?' Mjoll asked sharply.  
  
'Morthal,' Hofgrir replied, shifting away from her cautiously. 'Took a carriage... There might have been someone with her; mayhap even this friend of yours. Can't remember; the fellow is kind of... hard to notice'.  
  
  
Without a second thought, Mjoll bought Hofgrir's finest horse - the stablemaster hastened to offer her a discount in exchange for not breathing a word to Haelga. And as the good beast's hooves pounded upon the frozen ground, her mind throbbed in unison - haunted by a persistent train of thought. Morthal... Why Morthal? That was where she and Aerin first met - maybe the blighted ash-face thought it would be symbolic to torment him there... But no; that would be even more ridiculous than the plots of some of those books Aerin was so fond of reading - and besides, the scum had no way of knowing that story. Unless she had listened in on them, skulking in the shadows like the rat that she was... What if... What if she knew about Grimsever? What if she was planning to torture Aerin into giving her the sword's precise location? Lady Kyne, couldn't that worthless nag go any faster?!  
  
The plains of Whiterun Hold, which she had to cross before turning towards Hjaalmarch, slid by in a dark blur; Mjoll spurred the poor, panting, frothing horse with her iron boots till she drew blood. Normally, she would never be as cruel - but time was running short, and her mind was clouded by an image of Aerin's face, twisted into a mute grimace of fear and pain, tears streaming down his cheeks...   
  
'I am coming, Aerin!' she screamed over the whistle of the wind in her ears and leaning towards the horse's neck. 'Please, please hold on! I love you!'  
  
Those last words, which had torn their way out of her very soul, stunned her so much that for a moment, the vision was dispelled and she came to her senses, glancing down in horror at the heaving, glistening flanks of her mount. She remembered an adventure story she had once read over Aerin's shoulder... it was about four Breton cavaliers that were in such a hurry to get somewhere - something about a missing piece of jewelry and saving a queen's honour - that their horses kept dying right in mid-gallop. She had laughed at it back then - but now it seemed that her hapless steed was about to repeat the fate of the beasts from the story. She pulled at the reins - and clambered out of the saddle, for the moment the horse stopped, his knees gave way and he lay down on the road, breathing heavily, his eyes dim, almost tearful, beneath the tangled strands of his mane.  
  
Her heart contracting with guilt, Mjoll squatted next to the horse and passed her hand gently along his neck. 'I am so sorry,' she whispered, reaching into her sash. Many years of adventuring had taught her to always have a few restorative draughts handy; finding the one that replenished drained stamina, she uncorked the bottle and, parting the horse's jaws - not without an effort - poured its contents into his mouth. The steed let out a loud, shuddering neigh; his breathing became more regular, and in a few moments, he even began making his first attempts to stand up, his legs quivering and unsteady like a newborn colt's. She could have stayed and helped him further, healing him completely and setting him on the dangerous way back to Riften, through the darkness that was coming alive with the noises of the wilds - but she could not afford to linger. Aerin's life could well be hanging upon a thread; she had to get to him before that thread snapped in two. With a final farewell glance at her long-suffering mount, Mjoll spread out her shoulders, lit the torch she had found in the saddlebag, and continued the journey on foot.  
  
  
She did not mind covering long distances; merely a few months ago, that had been her calling in life. She marched down the road in steady, bold strides, guided by the pale light of the twin moons, and while her feet moved rhythmically one in front of the other, her mind once again began wandering to Aerin and his plight... She did not even register the attacks of a few stray wolves - the beasts had apparently grown more daring under the cover of the night - and was it a vampire?.. She could not be sure. Her sword arm did all the habitual work, thrusting and slashing and chopping, but her eyes did not see the blood or the gashes her weapon made in the living - and perhaps undead - flesh. Her eyes were sinking deeper and deeper into Aerin's...  
  
  
She jerked awake when, with a small splash, a snowball hit her on the back of the head. She had not noticed how the night had turned into morning; she had forgotten how many hours she had walked this way, without daring to stop and rest; she had not realized until now that her entire body was aching with weariness... The world came rushing back round her like a river filling the bed that had been dried up in summer. The soft, porous snow and the smell of the marsh. The outlines of the Morthal rooftops looming through the mist. And young voices laughing.  
  
They soon leapt onto the road, the two lads who had accidentally dragged her into their snowball fight. One was a Redguard, barely out of his teens, wrapped in several layers of furs that hindered his movement; another, a Nord with vivid warpaint, older and more sturdily built than his companion; his clothes were much lighter, and he dashed from side to side like a hare, pelting the Redguard with snowballs. Following the two at a distance, was an Altmer - perhaps the lads' mentor; his gait was slow and much more dignified, and even though he was smiling at the youngsters' antics, as he drew closer, Mjoll noticed, blinking slowly, her vision a little blurred for lack of sleep, that there were deep lines crossing his tall forehead... Lines left by anxiety and heavy thoughts.  
  
It did not take the lads long to notice the white mark left on Mjoll's armour by the snowball; the Redguard trotted up to her and blurted out an apology,  
  
'Please, m'am, we didn't mean to... We were just goofing around; I mean, er...' he blushed a little and glanced over his shoulder at the Altmer. 'Passing the time pleasantly!'  
  
Mjoll smiled at him.  
  
'No harm done,' she replied, a little thickly. 'Are you travelers on the way to Morthal too?'  
  
'Not exactly,' the Nord said. 'We are returning there for a rest after an expedition! ' He puffed out his chest with an air of utmost importance. 'We were gathering the local lore on Movarth, the famous vampire - first, we questioned the townsfolk, and then, we took a trip to the beast's lair - which is now empty...'  
  
'It's part of our History project!' the Redguard piped in eagerly. 'It's all very exciting!'  
  
'For us, first and foremost,' the Altmer said, stepping forward and giving Mjoll a courteous bow. 'Please, pardon my overzealous apprentices here; they are too immersed in their research to think about manners. My name is Viarmo; and these _promising historians_ are Ataf,' the Redguard waved his hand timidly, coughing a little at the subtle irony in his mentor's words. 'And Jorn,' the Nord grinned. 'I am mostly here to keep these two from tripping over their feet and getting lost, so they can get back safely to their History master.... and also, to entertain myself. Sitting in a stuffy study in the capital tends to get boring...'  
  
'Oh, you are from the capital?' Mjoll asked, as the small company started walking down the path towards Morthal again.  
  
Viarmo nodded.  
  
'We are bards. From the Bards' College'.  
  
'Master Viarmo is the Headmaster!' Ataf remarked. 'He needn't have come with us apprentices  anywhere, but he said he couldn't sit still, and...'  
  
Jorn tugged him by the sleeve, and he fell silent, smiling sheepishly.  
  
Mjoll knit her eyebrows thoughtfully. Bards. Fancy that. Well, bards were usually an observant lot - you have to notice things if you want to write a story about them... What if they had come across something that might help her find Aerin?  
  
'I say...' she asked slowly. 'Have you seen a young Imperial man, well-dressed, with brown hair and eyes?'  
  
The three bards shook their heads.  
  
Figures. Aerin had never been the one to draw the attention of others... But his captor, on the other hand...  
  
'What about a Dunmer woman... A rogue, not too tall, wearing leather armour, with short bristling red hair and a... a very indecent look on her face?'  
  
The two apprentices exchanged startled glances, while Viarmo grew just a tiny bit paler and said, much too loudly,  
  
'No - why do you ask? Do you... have reason to believe she might be here - in Morthal?'  
  
'Aye,' Mjoll replied gravely. 'And I intend to find her'.  
  
'In that case...' Now, that was strange; were the Altmer's lips trembling? 'In that case... Let me help you look for her!'  
  
'But Master Viarmo...' Ataf said tentatively, 'If that's your... I mean, didn't you...? Shouldn't you... let it rest?'  
  
'Don't give me advice, boy!' Viarmo snapped irritably, his voice suddenly metallically sharp. 'You two may go frolic about; meet us at the local inn in the afternoon - come on, go, go!'  
  
The lads withdrew, looking rather apprehensive - and Viarmo turned to Mjoll, his eyes flaring up, his hands shaking feverishly.  
  
'Please... It is not the first time I've done this... I can be of assistance! '  
  
'All right,' Mjoll said, looking at his sideways. What did he mean, it was not the first time he'd done this? Not the first time he'd searched for someone - or not the first time he'd searched for that particular Dunmer? There was definitely something wrong with that elf... But she was too tired to waste her time figuring out what exactly.  
  
  
  
'Nothing...' Viarmo said, sinking onto a tavern stool and burying his face in his hands, his voice quiet and hollow. It soon became clear that he was talking to himself rather than to his drowsy, uncomprehending companion. 'Nothing... Again... Gods, it is just like that evening in Riften... I waited for her, in the rain, and she never came... She is never going to be mine again... This is all... so pointless... The boy is right - I have to let it rest... Why... Why can't I?'  
  
Mjoll let his words slide across the surface of her mind, their meaning not penetrating. She felt completely drained; her strength and willpower had been squeezed out of her like water out of a towel. The trail was going cold; the locals had not seen the rogue; and she was so very, very tired...  
  
She must have blacked out, because she could not for the life of her figure out how she found herself sitting opposite Viarmo, or when exactly he had lifted his head and reached out to her and placed one hand on her shoulder...  
  
'Forgive me,' he said earnestly. 'I let my old heartaches overpower me and completely forgot that you must have yours as well. You have obviously come a long way; you look terribly road-weary... Your quest must be very important to you. If I may - what is it that lead you here? And how does my... this Dunmer rogue tie in?'  
  
'She kidnapped my friend,' Mjoll replied. With every next word the she spoke, the flame of anger burned stronger and stronger within her heart, temporarily clearing the haze in her mind. 'I suspect she might want to torture him... And I have come this far to free him - and punish the little rat for her deed!'  
  
Viarmo rose from his seat, a vein jerking in his temple.  
  
'You must be mistaken,' he said, breathing heavily through his nose, his voice rising by the second. 'She... has her problems with the law, but she would never harm an innocent! Not... not in the way you...'  
  
'She is a Ratway thief,' Mjoll interrupted curtly. 'Nothing is sacred for those scumbags'.  
  
'No!' Viarmo was almost screaming now. 'You... You are wrong about her! You don't know her like I do! She may be trying to hide it, but her true self shines through! I have seen it!'  
  
Mjoll got to her feet as well, now completely awake. Didn't know her like he did, did she? So that bard was in league with the rogue... She choked on a rising lump in her throat, struck by a sudden thought. During their search in Morthal, it was Viarmo who had been asking most of the questions to the townsfolk, her being too sleepy to put two words together. What if - what if all of this had been a ruse, a show acted out between the bard and the locals for her benefit... to make her believe that the Dunmer had never passed through here, to throw her off track? She had to start all over, to make sure that no clue escaped her! Use brute force if need be... Aerin was depending on her!  
  
'Out of my way, bard,' she hissed, making a beeline for the exit. 'I will deal with you later! For now, I will have to keep looking for that ashborn outlaw!'  
  
He side-stepped to block her path, his face drained of almost all colour.  
  
 _'I cannot let you find her,'_ he breathed, as Mjoll tried to brush past him and he moved over to stand in front of her again, as if in a dance. _'I cannot let you hurt her!'_  
  
The innkeeper was busy arguing behind the wall with some loud-mouthed Orc... Apparently, the fellow fancied himself a bard and wanted to let the visiting College Headmaster hear the loud growls he called singing. Thus, she was not there to stop Mjoll and Viarmo - and they repeated their little ballet routine until the Altmer found himself standing with his back towards the inn door. Mjoll managed to push it open, diving beneath his arm, but he gripped tightly at the door posts, his feet glued to the floor, refusing to let her through. She shoved at his chest with her shoulder, but he stood firm. So, he wanted to do this the hard way? Well, she was not to blame; if he had taken the Dunmer's side, that made him no better than she was. Shutting her eyes tightly, Mjoll pushed with all her mighty warrior woman strength; Viarmo cried out and lost balance, falling forward and hitting his head - rather painfully, by the sound of it - on the ground. For a moment, she lingered at his side to make sure that he was breathing. She would need him alive for later questioning - and who knows, maybe there was still hope for him, a chance to mend his ways and get out from under corrupting influence... Though experience had taught her to doubt that.  
  
'So this ended in violence,' she said, looking down at the bard for one last time. 'You really shouldn't have stood up for that piece of filth'.  
  
'Her name...' he groaned, glaring at Mjoll from beneath his eyelids, which were slowly sliding shut, 'Is Illari... Illa... My Illa...'  
  
Just as he fell silent, his face going blank, the two younger bards strolled onto the inn porch, apparently back from their frolicking. Mjoll froze when her eyes met the lads'; and so did they. For a few age-long seconds, they looked on at the scene in silence; then, Jorn crouched next to Viarmo, his eyes widening in terror.  
  
'Master Viarmo!' he called out hoarsely, lifting the Altmer's head and waving his hand in front of his waxen face. 'Master Viarmo, can you hear me? Are you badly hurt?'  
  
Viarmo half-opened his eyes; the loss of consciousness had only been momentary.  
  
'No... fuss...' he mumbled, sounding a little slurred. 'I am fine... Just... dizzy... And... everything sounds... as if... underwater...'  
  
'Don't worry, Master,' the lad reassured him vehemently. 'We... We will get you to a healer - remember, that nice old lady called Lami - and then we'll go back home to Solitude!.. You!' he looked up at Mjoll, eyebrows knitted. 'What have you done to him?! Quick, Ataf - don't just stand there! Call the guards!'


	10. Chapter 10

She had resisted arrest, of course. They had no right to detain her - she had done nothing wrong! They called it an assault - but she had merely dealt with an outlaw's accomplice who was hindering the cause of justice! Was trying to stop a criminal an offence now?.. But when the guard who was trying to twist her arms behind her back called for reinforcement, and his fellows arrived, axes on the ready, she had to give in. Not out of cowardice - she could have taken on all of them... No. The Champion of Riften did not cross blades with the servants of the law. Not even with the most corrupt ones. Instead, she put them to shame by carrying out the very duties they failed at.  
  
Although, the instant the cell door clanked shut behind her, she regretted sticking to her principles. They said she'd be held in jail, 'to cool off', for a couple of days... Might as well have been a couple of centuries. Who was to know what that accursed rogue was doing to Aerin while Mjoll was sitting hunched on the floor of her cage, her forehead pressed against her knees, the texture of the sacking pants she had been forced to change into imprinting itself into her skin...   
  
Oh Mara, she felt so terrible. Anxious. Weary. Useless, so utterly useless. And not to mention, humiliated. The staunch protector of the poor and downtrodden, the guardian of the law, trapped inside a stiflingly tiny prison cell, bearing the very punishment she had sought to bring upon the heads of wrongdoers... The hunter, reduced to the level of the prey. The lioness, turned into common vermin.   
  
As, quite in spite of herself, she started drifting off to sleep again, her mind grew crowded with visions, like a market square on the town fair day. People pointing fingers, laughing, or shaking their heads in disappointment and disbelief; the bloody Dunmer, leering, gloating over her failure to catch her and bring her to justice; and Aerin, her darling Aerin, gazing at her with tear-filled eyes, a trickle of blood drawing a smooth dark line across his face, whiter than the freshest snow upon the mountain slopes...   
  
  
The ghostly crowd scattered at the sound of the jailer's gruff voice,  
  
'Hey you there, outsider! Your fine's been paid. You're free to go - grab your gear in that chest by the door and move out!'  
  
Opening her eyes, she saw the door swing open. It took her some time to realize that this was not part of her dream - but as she did, she staggered to her feet and stumbled forward, out of the cell, hurrying to carry out the jailer's orders as quickly as possible. Standing in front of the evidence chest and fumbling with her armour straps, she heard another voice, not a great deal friendlier than the jailor's,  
  
'You are lucky my wife's potions got the elf to his feet. I wouldn't have been able to afford the thousand gold they charge for murder'.  
  
She glanced back over the edge of her pauldron - and started, her gaze meeting a very intense glare from beneath a pair of bushy eyebrows, lowered so much that it was difficult to make out the colour of their owner's eyes. Mjoll's benefactor was a sturdy Nord man with a long, thick black beard; his clothes had obviously seen better days, and his whole air screamed, 'I hate this town with all my heart, but it's not like I can just up and move!'. She had grown more than familiar with that kind of look during her stay in Riften.  
  
'Name's Jorgen,' the man grunted, stretching out his hand for a greeting. 'Run the local lumber mill; the only thing in this hole that at least pretends to be working. Was out in the wilds scouting for new trees to cut - when I came back home, found my old crone spending half her time at the inn, cooing over some elf with a bandaged head, and the whole town talking about you and how you almost knocked his brains out'.  
  
Mjoll coughed. That was not the way she preferred to describe her feats.  
  
'Why... Why did you bail me out?' she asked when the two of them stepped out into the open air.  
  
Jorgen let out a low guttural sound, like a bear slowly wakening from his sleep, about to tear apart the hunters that dared to disturb him.  
  
'I heard my wife's new pet patient ramble how you are out to get that grey-skin thief... because she kidnapped your friend or something'.  
  
'She did,' Mjoll nodded.  
  
Jorgen's eyes flashed ominously in the dark shadow of his eyebrows.  
  
'The High Elf thinks she didn't do it; the way he goes on, it looks like he's in love with her or somethin'... But I believe your side of the story. And I want you to tell it to our Jarl. You see,' there went that bear-like sound again, this time much louder, 'That rogue is nothing but trouble; but the Jarl refuses to run her out of town once and for all - instead, the blasted elf comes and goes as she pleases, and wanders in and out of Highmoon Hall as if it was her kitchen garden... while most folks have to wait for days to as much as see old Idgrod show her face. Our Jarl has never been...' Jorgen made an uncomfortable pause, clearly embarrassed, '...Sane... But now it looks like her reason's been blinded completely. I want you to open her eyes, outsider - to make her see her little grey-skinned friend for what she really is. If you will do that for me - for all of Morthal! - I promise, I swear to you we will gather a group of able-bodied men and women, and help you save your friend!'   
  
  
He did not have to ask her twice. A search party was precisely what Mjoll needed to locate Aerin and set him free. And what better way to gain the help of that search party than bring about the downfall of her poor lamb's captor!  
  
  
This definitely had to be not the first time Jorgen did this. There was too much practiced confidence in the way he strolled up the front steps of the Jarl's house; and stood, legs wide apart, hands on his hips, as if daring the solemn wooden building to a fist fight; and cleared his throat, loudly, decisively - and called out, in a booming voice that drew idle onlookers from their homes and the porch of the local inn,  
  
'Jarl Idgrod! Come out and heed the voice of the people! You have warmed a viper on your chest - the elven woman you have chosen as your Thane is nothing but a lowly criminal, and this outsider here has proof of that! Come out, Jarl, and hear her speak! The truth is not behind your closed doors and inside your visions - the truth is out here! Face the truth, Jarl!'  
  
That was a catchy turn of phrase, very catchy indeed - the gathering crowd had sensed that, and soon, Jorgen's voice was joined by many others, male and female, chanting loudly,  
  
'Face the truth! Face the truth! Face the truth!'  
  
Mjoll herself could not resist repeating those words over and over together with the people of Morthal. There was a strong, fierce, irresistible rhythm in them - every short, abrupt syllable was like a thrust of a war axe, and pronouncing them felt almost like striking the blighted Dunmer herself...  
  
'Truth is very much like a curse word, good Jorgen. One often uses it when it is inappropriate'.  
  
The crowd fell silent. The Jarl had come out - a tall woman with a deeply lined face and flowing raven hair flecked with threads of fine silver. Despite her age, she stood firm and proud, facing her people with her arms folded on her chest and her expression impenetrably calm. She had the most disturbingly shrewd eyes that bored into you, gleaming metallically, like ancient Nord carving tools, peeling off layer after layer of your soul till they reached its very core... They lingered on Mjoll for quite a while; this made her uneasy, and she let out a huge sigh of relief when a distraction came along. A dark-haired, barely shaven man - perhaps a steward or a housecarl - poked his head out of the loghouse's door and said anxiously,  
  
'Idgrod, let me deal with them'.  
  
She brushed him off with an impatient wave of her hand,  
  
'Don't cluck at me, Aslfur; go inside and watch the children'.  
  
The head shrank back meekly, and the Jarl turned to face the crowd again.  
  
'Before you go about calling something the truth,' she went on, narrowing her eyes and letting her intent gaze sink into each of the rioters in turn, 'Stop and think if it is true for anyone else but you. You mock my visions; but what they tell me helps me weigh each of our own little truths and decide if they really are what they seem. Take this stranger, for instance, the one you so proudly consider your chief piece of evidence against the Thane...'  
  
Mjoll felt her heart twist into a knot, as if she was a schoolchild reprimanded by a teacher in front of the whole class.   
  
'When I look at her, a vision appears before me. I see a village, leveled to the ground by raging fire. Not a wild forest blaze started by a lightning strike - no, a flame that has sprung from torches carried by men with hard faces and even harder hearts. I see blood, and I see faces distorted by screams that could have shattered the heavens themselves. I see men's bellies sliced open as though they were dumb beasts at a slaughterhouse, and I see women violated and left to die, curled up, shivering, in the mud. I see bandits marching through what but an hour ago used to be the main street; their arms are laden with loot and their minds are drunken with the smell of death. I see a huge, bearded man grab a small boy by the arm and lift him in the air and sink a blade into his chest; I see him throw back his head and laugh, because the boy's legs are still kicking at the air even though he is dead - and the bandit finds it terribly funny. And I see a teenage girl, fair-haired like the poor boy, watch it all from inside the charred ruins of her home. Half of her face is smeared with soot, and when she grows up, she will wear her warpaint in a way that precisely repeats the shape of that dark-grey spot. Because she will remember. For as long as she lives, she will remember it all. The destruction of her village. The death of her mother, a strong warrior who taught her all her fighting moves, and her father, a bold, adventurous hunter who was not afraid to cross the border into the Dark Elf lands and show his children the strange creatures that live there. And the laughter of the bandit that ran her little brother through. And these memories will plant in her heart a bitter hatred towards all outlaws. Bandits, marauders, raiders, thieves... She will never miss a chance to clear out one of their hideouts, hunting its dwellers down to the last. No mercy. No compromise. And in her mind, there will be firmly lodged a notion that breaking the law leaves a stain that cannot be washed clean. That all thieves and bandits are inherently evil, and no matter what they do, they do it with a dark purpose in mind. That if a known thief is seen in the company of the man she loves, this means she has to rush to his rescue. Because the thief's only intention can be to hurt him, not help him. Such is your friend's truth, but is it really true? Are thieves committing acts of good just as against the laws of nature as, say, fur-covered Argonians?'  
  
Mjoll felt her head swim. How... How did the Jarl know all this? About her past? About the way she lost her family? About her feelings towards bandits? The shock of having her heart dissected in public, and the pain inflicted by the memories Jarl Idgrod had stirred - these two feelings sank their red-hot claws into her heart, making her want to scream... She would have screamed for sure, if it wasn't for the soft, mocking voice that suddenly rang through the tense silence,  
  
'Oh gods, fur-covered Argonians! I will have to remarry my ex just for the sake of sharing that what's-it-called... simile with him!'  
  
  
Mjoll's would-be outcry of pain turned into an enraged roar. She was here. Aerin's kidnapper was here! She had materialized out of nowhere at Jarl Idgrod's side - the wretch must have been eavesdropping on them under the influence of an invisibility potion! And sweet Stendarr, there was that accursed smirk on her face! Just look, look at her! How she could not be inherently evil?! How could what the Jarl called 'Mjoll's own little truth' not be true?!  
  
Pushing the petrified, horror-struck rioters aside, Mjoll swept towards the Dunmer, bearing her axe.  
  
'What have you done to Aerin, you little b...'  
  
'Whoah, whoah!' the Dunmer hurried to whip out her own weapon; Mjoll's blow made her sink to her knees, but she managed to block most of the impact with her sword, sending a shower of sparks flying in all directions. 'Let's all keep calm and civil! Your precious bonnie-boy is fine!'  
  
 _'Liar!'_ Mjoll choked, breaking through the Dunmer's block and forcing the edge of her axe underneath her chin. 'You have him locked up somewhere, in shackles, half-starved, don't you?!' She pressed the sharp metal deeper and deeper into the rogue's skin, till the first droplets of blood started rolling down along the curve of her axe. 'Don't you?!'  
  
'M-Mjoll... P-p-please d-don't make me use this thing...'  
  
The cold touch of a blade against her neck and the sound of the sweet, familiar, stammering voice in her ear almost made Mjoll cough out her heart. Slowly, as though in a dream, she let go of her axe and slanted her eyes to try and make out if the person holding her at swordpoint was who she thought it was. This was insanity, pure insanity! Aerin! Trembling but resolute, wearing a scratched, battered set of glass armour and wielding... _Grimsever!_ By the Divines, she had the tip of her own long-lost sword against her throat - scratching her skin a little, because Aerin's hand was very unsteady.  
  
While Mjoll was gaping silently at this evident trick of Sheogorath, the Dunmer had managed to get to her feet.  
  
'Easy now,' she said soothingly, touching Aerin's elbow with her fingertips. 'You don't want to cut her head off by accident... Not after you've come this far'.  
He lowered the sword and stretched his hand out to Mjoll, his eyes rounded and apologetic.  
  
'I am so sorry,' he whispered as Mjoll straightened herself up. 'I... I had to do this. To protect Illa. You... We both misjudged her. She is not what she appears to be'.  
  
'Neither are you, little buddy,' the Dunmer chuckled, prodding him playfully in the ribs. 'You know what they say about standing up to your enemies and standing up to your friends! You have a lion's heart to match Mjoll's!'  
  
Mjoll blinked.  
  
'You... You have Grimsever...' she mumbled blankly.  
  
'But of course!' the Dunmer grinned. 'Went to the ruin you lost it in and retrieved it! Aerin here did most of the heroic stuff - I was just with him for backup. He was so eager to prove himself to you!'  
  
Aerin blushed.  
  
'Illa saved my life more than once,' he said, his tone firm and sincere. 'Without her courage and kindness, I... we would never have brought Grimsever back to you'.  
  
  
The hairs on the back of Mjoll's head stood on end; she could feel Jarl Idgrod watching her, sizing her up, divining what her next move would be... Could the old woman have been right?.. Perhaps Mjoll really had let her grief and bitterness blind her, taint her judgment... Perhaps there were outlaws not without repair... Perhaps this Dunmer really did mean well, in her own twisted way... This thought would be hard to live with, after years and years of relentless vengeance - but she was strong enough to admit she had been wrong, to see past her little truth... Or at least try to.  
  
'It looks I still have much to learn,' she said at length, lowering her eyes.  
  
'Don't we all?' Jarl Idgrod smiled. 'Don't we all?'  
  
Seeing that there would be no more dramatic clashes, the crowd began to disperse (Jorgen gave Mjoll a very dark look before trudging off to his house, but said nothing); the Jarl, too, went inside, and the two humans and an elf found themselves alone in a deserted street.  
  
'I... I think I'd better head to the inn and apologize to that Altmer I mistook for your accomplice,' Mjoll remarked with a nervous laugh that would have been far more fitting for Aerin. 'I don't know about that whole true self shining through thing, but you didn't kidnap Aerin - he was right on that account'.  
  
The Dunmer started.  
  
'Altmer? What Altmer? Not the hairy, bearded, unbearably handsome bard kind of Altmer?'  
  
'Well, he is rather bushy-haired, yes... And he did say he was a bard from the capital... I...' Mjoll looked the Dunmer steadily in the eyes and braced herself for a possible reaction. 'I knocked him out. He was trying to stop me from reaching you, and I... resolved to force. He is much better now, though. The local herbalist is taking good care of him'.  
  
The Dunmer's eyes turned into two blindingly bright firestorms.  
  
'You did what?!' she shrieked, raising her hands and bending her fingers like claws, aiming for Mjoll's face. 'You... you hurt my Viarmo?! _Why, I will spill your guts, you pink-faced s'wit!'_  
  
She would have pounced on Mjoll like a wild cat - but her way was barred by Aerin, who leapt in front of Mjoll and spread out his arms, rather resembling a mother hen protecting her young.  
  
'Please, please, _please_ stop trying to kill each other!' he begged, his lower lip quivering childishly.  
  
'Your courage really has no limits, does it?' the Dunmer sneered, breathing heavily. 'Fine, Mjoll the Lioness, I will leave you be, for the bonnie boy's sake - but watch out when you return to Riften. I might spring out of a dark alley and punch you in the jaw. Now, if you'll excuse me - I have an injured ex-husband to fawn over'.  
  
And with those words, she walked away, swinging her hips as if on board a ship in a storm.  
  
'And here I was beginning to see some good in her,' Mjoll muttered, watching her stroll towards the inn.  
  
'Don't take her threat to heart,' Aerin said pleadingly. 'She loves that Altmer - and you know the kinds of things people do for the sake of loved ones...'  
  
Mjoll cocked her head to one side and gave him a long, meaningful look.  
  
'Like delving into dungeons and finding lost swords?' she asked, before she could stop herself. What were those words coming out of her mouth? What was that smile playing on her lips? It had to be that shameless Dunmer strumpet's corrupting influence!  
  
Aerin passed his hand over his hair, smoothening it - quite well, too, for his palm was sweaty.  
  
'Mjoll... Please... Please don't be offended at what I am about to do...' he said with a fierce blush.  
  
And, stepping closer towards her, almost scorching her with the heat of the flush on his face, he placed his hands on her waist - or rather cupped his fingers about an inch from her body... and kissed her. And in that kiss, in the great effort he put into moving his tongue - he was evidently struggling to do it right - she could sense the Dunmer's influence as well... Not that she complained.  
  
  
  
'Well now, how does that feel?' Lami asked gently, unwrapping the bandage and taking it off Viarmo's head. 'I used my most potent mixtures; some healing scrolls that Falion lent me, too - even though Jorgen disapproved'.  
  
Viarmo frowned and moved his head from side to side.  
  
'The headache seems to be gone...' he said slowly. 'And so does the hum in my ears... But I have to make sure. Let me see...'   
  
He cleared his throat, tucked two fingers beneath his coat and recited, loudly and with feeling, changing the tone of his voice when there were multiple characters speaking,  
  
 _‘When King Maraneon's alchemist had to leave his station  
After a laboratory experiment that yielded detonation,  
The word went out that the King did want  
A new savant  
To mix his potions and brews.  
But he declared he would only choose  
A fellow who knew the tricks and the tools.  
The King refused to hire on more fools.  
  
After much deliberation, discussions, and debates,  
The King picked two well-learned candidates.  
Ianthippus Minthurk and Umphatic Faer,  
An ambitious pair,  
Vied to prove which one was the best.  
Said the King, "There will be a test…"_  
  
'Dear me!' Lami exclaimed in astonishment. 'You don't know the entire Song of the Alchemists by heart, do you?'  
  
'I used to, before that blow on the head,' Viarmo replied. 'Now I am not so certain... You said it was your favourite book - could you find it and double-check..?'  
  
The herbalist chuckled. 'There is nothing wrong with your memory, stop worrying!'  
  
'I need to be absolutely sure of that,' he persisted. 'Memory is a bard's main weapon'.  
  
'Someone shut me up before I make a dirty joke,' said a voice that Viarmo would have recognized even if he had forgotten everything else.  
  
'Illa!' he cried out, leaping up from the edge of the bed where he sat and sweeping the Dunmer off her feet in an embrace that made Lami conclude that her patient's strength was completely restored. She had heard her husband say all kinds of things about that Dunmer, but the way those two gazed into each other's eyes made Jorgen's angry rants rather hard to believe...  
  
'That crazy woman did not harm you, did she?' Viarmo asked, running his fingers along Illa's neck. Lady Dibella, it felt so heavenly to touch her again...  
  
'She is not crazy, just a bit holier-than-thou,' she smiled in between giving in to his swift, hungry kisses. 'And it's me who is going to be harming her, after I am done here'.  
  
'Well, I'd best be going,' Lami said with an unobtrusive cough. 'Your two boys are wandering somewhere around town - they were so worried about you, the poor dears, I sent them off for a breath of fresh air... If I bump into them, I will tell them that you don't want to be disturbed'.  
  
'Mhm,' Viarmo agreed incoherently, falling back onto the bed and feeling his body melt away whenever Illa's hands caressed it.  
  
After a few golden, inebriating minutes, she froze suddenly, and broke her kiss, and gazed down at Viarmo, who lay, laughing noiselessly, on the crumpled pillow... and smiled, a sad and earnest smile, with a light in her eyes that he had never seen before.  
  
'I _did_ come to the stables, you know,' she said quietly, sliding her hand along the outline of his face. 'That night in Riften. I watched you wait for me and drive away. All I needed was to make one step, one little step, out of the shadows towards you - and I didn't do it. At the time, I thought that I was done for, once a thief, always a thief... That I cannot change who I am. But then, I met this boy, Aerin... A sorry little mouse if there ever was one. In love with that feisty lady that knocked you out. I travelled with him on a quest to prove himself to her. And with every step that we made, I could see him struggling to change who he was... To find courage and resolve. He failed miserably most of the time, but at least he was trying. Fighting himself in a way I have never done... And then I thought...' Her voice trembled; and Viarmo's heart contracted painfully when he saw a tear roll down her cheek. 'What stops me from trying as well?.. I love you; and every day, it grows harder and harder for me to live without you. I know that I will never change completely, that I will never become as good and pure as you are... But I can try. I can go straight; join some normal, law-abiding guild, help people in the open... Perhaps even check out that High Hrothgar summons thing...'  
  
'You _are_ good and pure, Illa,' he whispered, weaving his arm over her shoulders and drawing her down to his chest. 'You just refuse to see it'.  
  
'Well, maybe clearing my name will make me see it,' she said, rubbing her head, cat-like, against him. 'I think tomorrow I'll take the road to Whiterun... See if the Companions are still recruiting... Granddad has been nagging at me about making an honest living as a warrior for ages now'.  
  
'Does this mean you'll be slipping away while I am asleep - again?' he asked, his hands circling across her back.  
  
'You know there's no point in trying to stop me,' she smirked.  
  
'Then... I'll keep us both awake for as long as I can,' he said, and took a gentle nibble at the tip of her ear. The first bite of a night-long feast.  
  
  
Viarmo stayed true to his word. For hours, he kept himself and Illa from falling asleep - and the entire town as well. Although, there was Mjoll and Aerin's contribution to consider, too...


End file.
